Published on Dec 31, 2005

Public premises must be made more accessible. The rights of disabled people will move from the margins to the forefront in the new year due to their success in pushing for a law that ensures public premises are equipped with facilities that make them accessible to the physically impaired. Nearly 5 million Thais with disabilities struggle to get around in their daily lives because most public buildings lack basic facilities for them.

However, nearly half a million people registered with disabilities succeeded in their drive for a law that ensures new buildings are constructed with facilities for the disabled. A ministerial regulation ensuring this has been in effect since September 2, 2005.

The group will be more vocal in pursuing rights and standard facilities for the disabled in 2006.

“Places that need to provide facilities for physically impaired people must do so according to the ministerial regulation or we will sue,” said Ampol Pornprathanvej, the secretary of an independent committee for equality.

“The year 2006 will be the year of us suing for basic facilities in public places. It’s a first step and this is the end of an era of the wait-and-see approach.”

Suporntham Mongkol sawat, the committee’s chairman, said that physically impaired people were deterred from living side by side with their able-bodied peers by the lack of facilities for them. Some buildings fail to comply with the law and others have built facilities that are useless, said Suporntham, who gets around in a wheelchair.

“The disabled are not just a mere 7 per cent of population, but also family members and friends,” he said.

He called for more elderly and disabled people to start using the new facilities so that society would know how great the demand for them is.

“We pay taxes too,” he said. Suporntham also called for the establishment of an advisory committee that includes disabled people. Ramps constructed by the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA) are not useful and facilities for the disabled have been installed at only five of the Skytrain’s stations, he said.

The vice chairman of the human rights committee of the National Council on Welfare of Thailand, Nakhon Chompoochat, said that disabled people would lodge complaints and file lawsuits in 2006 if they were treated unequally.

The disabled face limited access to opportunities in life and work due to social perceptions of them as abnormal, but facilities that allow them to move around can be built, Nakhon said.

Architect and vice dean of Silpakorn University Pattrapon Vetayasuporn agreed the disabled would sue government agencies and the BMA if facilities were not provided for them.

The disabled and elderly are entitled to such facilities, Pattrapon said.

Wiriya Namsiripongpun, an adviser to Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra and who represents the disabled, said the legal step taken was intended to encourage the participation of the physically impaired.

The new law will also ensure disabled people are not charged extra for taking equipment like wheelchairs or their guide dogs on public transport. Moreover, government offices are required to build facilities for the disabled.

Anan Paengnoy

The Nation