RECENTLY I was approached by disabled people with a variety of problems.
Last week a mother with walking difficulties came to see me for help. She desperately wanted to set up a food stall in Petaling Jaya so that she could support her two young kids. She was married to an abusive husband who offered no help to her, nor their children.
A week earlier, I visited a man who suddenly became blind through an inherited disorder. Without a job, the despondent gentleman had little cash in his hands.
His only support was RM90.00-a-month given by the government – plus some extras donated by one or two well-wishes.
He lives in a dirty flat with his brother whose eyesight is also growing blind.
I was also referred to a case of a deaf-mute young man who yearns for work, but nobody wants to employ him.
Several others told me that they do not know how to approach the welfare departments in their locality whilst others that do, say they are put off by unfriendly staff or officers who don’t give them the full information.
Trying to help all these people, I discovered, can frequently be equally as frustrating for the helper as it is for the person in need.
Early this week I received an email from my good friend Captain AKS Russell from Seremban, Negeri Sembilan state, about the very thing that is the subject of today’s article.
Having lived in Malaysia for over 30 years, the 61-year old wrote in to share with me an experience he and his wife Fasidah had just last week – when they visited the Department of Social Welfare (DSW) in Kuala Lumpur.
Their story is most telling indeed.
“We went up all the way to the 9th Floor of the Grand Seasons Avenue in Jalan Pahang – a place where we had to go to try to find out what was really needed to apply for a grant for a voluntary welfare organisation,” Russell explained.
“We did this after receiving two letters pertaining to a KL-based society that we volunteer with,” he explained before pointing out that neither of the missals gave the couple complete information about what was required for the application.
“It was beginning to look like a process leading to 'death by a thousand cuts',” he quipped.
Russell went on to say that although the DSW is a large office that is fully accessible to those in wheelchairs and others, it sadly still lacks a good public transport system to the building.
“For drivers, parking spaces are as rare as hen’s teeth!” He observed.
Russell also noted that many of the handicapped that were present – together with the elderly and the poor – had no choice but to resort hailing taxis in order to get them there.
“And it was obvious that most of them really could not afford them,” he noted.
When the couple arrived, they had to go through an initial screening before being given a number and asked to wait.
“Although the waiting room was large, clean and with plenty of seats, it was still insufficient for the large number of people who were waiting to be attended to,” observed Karim.
“Whilst waiting I overheard the clients being told by the staff upsetting words and phrases like, ‘you need to go first to such and such a place before we can attend to you . . .’, or ‘you will need to come back again another time . . .’”
“This kind of treatment only puts such people in further hardships instead of alleviating them,” Russell points out.
Many of them, however, patiently suffered in silence at such indignity, he said.
“What the DSW should do is to streamline efforts by going out of their offices and meeting their clients in their homes, at local community centres, and elsewhere in order to ensure that their services – no matter how ‘meagre’ – to such people is efficiently and expediently carried out.”
“Ivory towers must be dismantled; red tape destroyed and red herrings exterminated if sincere and effective help is to be carried out,” says Russell.
Websites should tell each visitor everything.
This includes all the necessary forms, criteria and other information needed for the various people in the target group-list that the DSW are trying to help instead of only providing telephone numbers and addresses of the respective departments, adds Russell.
“This goldmine of information should include a map of how to get the building proper as well as to the various departments; and not to forget details of wheelchair and blind access inside the building,” concludes Russell.
The End
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