Football star, Lionel Messi has joined a campaign to help visually impaired Ethiopians.
In a social media post, the Argentina’s World Cup-winning captain said he was honoured to team up with assistive devices company OrCam to donate visual aids to Ethiopians.
Impaired vision is one of the main public health issues in Ethiopia, with one study showing the prevalence of blindness in the country to be at 1.18% of the population.
According to OrCam, their visual aid device technology improves “the lives of individuals who are blind, visually impaired, and have reading difficulties”.
Last year, with the help of donors, Ethiopia’s first lady’s office donated the modern visual aid device to 2,000 people – mainly students and government workers.
The office said blind people were then able to read Amharic – which is the working language of the country – and English texts without the help of others.
Artificial Intelligence technology attached to the frame of eyeglasses enable visually impaired people to read and identify colours as it reads them out loud to the user.
The technology has been named one of 2019’s biggest innovations by Time magazine.
The OrCam MyEye glass is however expensive and unaffordable for many people with a single device costing more than $4,000 (£3,200).
Disabled Man’s Baby Sale: Family Not Happy With Delay Of Justice
The family of a Goldsmith with a physical disability who has accused his former girlfriend of selling their baby is not happy with the pace of the case in court.
The spokesperson for the Kpabitey family of Agormanya, Mr. Amos Kpabitey says the family is disappointed in the way the police are handling the case.
According to him, the family expected that the prosecutors and the court would consider their brother’s condition as a person with a physical disability and treat the case with some expedition. However, they keep adjourning the case and that is creating so much inconvenience for them, especially their brother.
It has been six months now since Mr. Tetteh Zoda reported his former girlfriend, Patience Mawutor, to the Police for allegedly selling their baby girl for Gh¢5,000.
She is standing trial together with her father, Henry Mawutor (a pastor), a Queen Mother, Nana Abena Nyarkoa II and a businesswoman, Jane Gerbs, as accomplices.
Since the case was first heard on September 16, 2022, it has been adjourned five times already; the latest being Wednesday, January 18, 2023, when it was adjourned because the prosecutor failed to serve the lawyers of the accused persons some documents.
Mr. Zoda’s family is not happy that the documents that were supposed to be served before the last adjourned date, were not served and rather done on the day.
The case has been adjourned to February 2, 2023.
The family is accusing the police of deliberately trying to frustrate them.
Mr. Amos Kpabitey complains that the delay is not only draining them financially but also stressing their brother physically and emotionally.
He explains that the police stations and court buildings are not disability-friendly and that makes climbing the steps very difficult for Mr. Zoda, and he sometimes crawls to access the buildings.
Mr. Kpabitey notes that the delay and the inconveniences could discourage persons with disabilities from pursuing justice when their rights are violated.
He is calling on the Ghana Police and the Judicial Services to give special consideration to cases involving persons with disabilities.
He believes that will inspire confidence and encourage the culture of seeking-justice within the disability community when they are abused.
Source: BBC
