Strive to be self-sufficient
A visually impaired farmer at Agona Asafo near Agona Swedru in the Central Region, Mr Evans Kweku Abure, has urged physically-challenged persons to get involved in productive ventures that would help improve their livelihood.
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The 57-year-old farmer said it was totally unacceptable for physically challenged persons to beg for alms at public places since it took away their dignity in society.
Speaking to The Mirror during a visit to his farm, Mr Abure charged physically-challenged persons capable of learning a trade to do so since that would go a long way to put smiles on their faces and earn them public respect.
Mr Abure has been a farmer since childhood and got visually impaired while working on his farm at the age of 35. Unperturbed by his challenged, he continued to engage in farming till now.
Farming activity
He has a 15-acre plot of land on which he cultivates maize, cocoyam, coconut and garden eggs to feed himself and sells the rest.
Mr Abure is always assisted by his younger brother, Kojo Essuon to get to his farm which is about an hour’s walk from where he lives. It is amazing to watch him go through his daily farming activity with zeal and tact.
He initially seeks assistance from other people to clear the land and he plants the crops after that. Watching him weed around his young maize plants was a sight to behold,carefully going about it in order not to cut down the plants.
Due to the distance to the farm, Mr Abure often gets to his farm tired and he relaxes for a while before starting to work. He usually carries food along and sits under a palm tree in the middle of farm to eat when he is hungry.
Burning sensation
Mr Abure told this writer on his farm that it had not been an easy journey since he became blind while working on his farm.
He recalled that while working on that fateful day, he felt a burning sensation in his eyes and asked to be taken the hospital. He was later diagnosed of suffering from glaucoma and declared blind.
According to him, he had to accept the challenge though a difficult one since he was not born visually impaired. He rather felt encouraged to continue with his farming activity since it was his only source of livelihood.
“At a point, friends and well-wishers were benevolent towards me, but I knew that the gesture could not last forever,” he pointed out.
He noted further that in the early days of his condition, he sometimes went to Swedru Senior High School (SWESCO) to weed and used the wages to take care of himself. He, however, eventually decided to concentrate on his own farm to keep himself active and improve his standard of living instead of being at the mercy of others.
Common Fund
Mr Abure lamented that members of the Ghana Federation of the Disabled in the Agona East District had not received their two per cent share of the District Assembly Common Fund (DACF) since 2002.
He indicated that members of the association were each given GH¢100 in 2002, but had not received any more funds from the assembly since then.
The visually impaired farmer, therefore, appealed to the government to carefully monitor all the Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies across the country to ensure that there was prompt payment of funds meant for People Living with Disabilities (PWDs).
By so doing, he said, it would enable the physically-challenged in the society to live respectable and dignified lives.