Deaf People's Association withdraws from federation

The Deaf People's Association has decided to resign from the federation of organisations for persons with disability, saying it felt that such organisations should be run by persons with disability themselves and that money collected from the public should be used on projects that really benefited them and their families.

The association said that almost all the members of the federation's executive were family of persons with disability, or professionals.

The association's own statute stipulates that at least half of its committee members have to be persons with disability.

The association said it also strongly disagreed that a substantial part of the money the federation received from the Strina programme was being used for it to have its own premises.

The association also considered as undemocratic the federation's decision that organisations that do not attend its meetings were not informed of the next meeting's agenda and were not provided with the minutes.

Moreover, this decision was never communicated to the associations and they were never given the opportunity to explain their positions, it said.

The Deaf People's Association said it would continue to work for the benefit of the deaf and their families and said it was ready to work with other organisations that were "truly representative of persons with disability and operated in a transparent and democratic manner".