Disability Organisations to Engage in Voter Education
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(Excerpted from KEPA Partner Newsletter Sep/2001)

http://www.kepa.fi/forum/uutiset?t=1&sid=1962

Realising that Zambia comprises citizens with various disabilities who are major stakeholders, the Action on Disability and Development (ADD), in partnership with the International Foundation For Elections Systems (IFES) in the United Kingdom, also in collaboration with the Zambia Federation of the Disabled (ZAFOD) have instituted a programme to raise the profile of disabled people in the forth coming tripartite elections before the end of the year 2001.

The two main objectives of the programme are voter education and election monitoring.
ADD and IFES will support ZAFOD in organising an election observation team of disabled people in Lusaka, Central, Southern, Eastern and Copperbelt provinces.

The programme is expected to be extended to the rest of the country in future elections.
Issues of disability and accommodating the needs of disabled people will be scrutinised before and after elections. To achieve this, the programme will :

- Train up to 50 representatives of different disabled persons to serve as election observers. These will work with other Zambian election monitors, and will be used as trainers in future elections.
- Advise the Government and the Electoral Commission about election access and disability issues aimed at accommodating the needs of voters with disabilities. Here, access to the voting facility for wheelchair users and a tactile ballot aid that will be used by the visually impaired to increase the confidentiality of their vote.

ADD and ZAFOD will also run a voter education programme specifically for disabled people in the five catchment areas.

The idea is to familiarise voters with voting day procedures, the importance of citizens´ participation in the elections, how to be more engaged in the political process prior to elections and also how to obtain information about aspiring candidates and political platforms.

As disabled people become more politically aware and understand better how they can be involved in the political process, they will be able to influence politicians to take account of their needs. In this way, politicians will be more aware of the needs of disabled people.

Through this process, disabled people will have the confidence of electing fellow disabled people as councillors, Members of Parliament or President.

John Mukopola