IT IS NO DISABILITY, IT IS THE REALITY: BEING TEXT OF AN ADDRESS DELIVERED BY TPL. TOYIN AYINDE, FORMER HON. COMMISSIONER, LAGOS STATE MINISTRY OF PHYSICAL PLANNING & URBAN DEVELOPMENT AND 2ND NATIONAL VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE NIGERIAN INSTITUTE OF TOWN PLANNERS AT THE RE-LAUNCH OF THESEABILITIES FOUNDATION ON SATURDAY, 7TH OCTOBER, 2017 Protocols Your Excellencies, Distinguished Ladies and Gentlemen It is with great humility, as well as delight, that I make this contribution at this important occasion of the Re-launch of Theseabilities Foundation, an organization pioneered by our beloved brother, Boye Abioye, who has gone ahead of us. It was a great concern for me deciding what to write about because, going down memory lane, I pictured the few moments we shared together, how especially my wife and I would call him, "Your Excellency" and he would reply calling us the same. He lived a normal life like any other person and, in the midst of it all, stepped into the White House to have a handshake with the President of the United States of America. That feat inspired the title of my brief address, "It is no disability, it is the reality". My encouragement at the end of this will be that you live your reality. American actor, Christopher Reeve must have been thinking in that direction when he said, "I refuse to allow a disability to determine how I live my life. I don't mean to be reckless, but setting a goal that seems a bit daunting actually is very helpful ...". Boye Abioye must have had this thought in mind when he attempted to do things like any other person with full capabilities, such as playing football, just as his elder brother, Toye Abioye, related to us at the Commendation Service last year. It takes one who has recognized his situation, acknowledged it and chosen to live his reality with a goal in mind to achieve that. Boye's disability, like Robert M. Hansel said, opened his eyes to his true abilities. It is the reason why he chose not to place "DIS" in his ability, but rather chose to replace "DIS" with "THESE" in the diverse abilities that he believed were available. To my mind, disability is a subject of interpretation, which differs from one person to the other. Incidentally, the majority is quick to point fingers at a few people who don't exactly look like they would have loved them to be, and so, christen what that minority lacks as disability. However, over time we have seen successful personalities with disabilities who rose above even the fully functional people (those who labeled them disabled) to claim their fame. Records are replete with names like Stephen Hawking, Helen Keller, John Nash, Christy Brown and Demosthenes, just to mention a few, who have had courage to face their realities and dismiss, with great determination, the things meant to be their disabilities. The stories of people like those mentioned make me perfectly understand the use of pun by Boye at the bottom of the letterhead of THESEABILITIES FOUNDATION. It reads, "Disabilities? Theseabilities - A Mind Thing". Do you get it? Disabilities can truly be Theseabilities, depending on whose mind it is configured. Every situation in life is given a meaning that depends on the context or perspective applied to it. For example, we can ask ourselves, what is normal, or what do we consider as normal? The answer will always depend on how we choose to interpret the situation. That's where perspective comes in. Imagine that every human being had no eyes, wouldn't we consider having one as being abnormal? If everyone we see around us had no legs, one person with a leg would look absurd. That makes the statement of Jesus Christ in Saint John's Gospel 9:3 have a new meaning to me. Of the man who had been born blind, he was asked the question, "who sinned, the man or his parents?" His answer: "none sinned; this was meant to reveal God's power in him." That is, who had issues, the man or his progenitors? Jesus says, no issues at all; everything is in perfect sync with the original plan. It is so, that something spectacular may happen. Man's contemporary reason for showing God's power is that things are working out as expected; "all correct " as we often say, but here we have another perspective - things not turning out as expected is not sufficient reason for God's power not to be made manifest. God is not waiting for anything to complete the ingredient for the manifestation of His power. That sends me thinking, how would the man with eyes, and the one without, rate before God? The same, I would presume. It probably means that God sees no difference between the two. What is important to Him is what you do with what you have or do not have. What therefore remains is our ability to translate whatever condition we find ourselves into an advantage. It means recognizing where we are, what we have (not what we don't), and mustering all the (inner) resources we need to make things work in our favour; sometimes, those resources will be out of the ordinary, coming from within and drawing towards us all the energies that make everything possible. And this is a spiritual activity. The lack of understanding that man is a spiritual being in motion and manifesting in the physical will probably be the strongest reason for the limit to every human possibility. This is because the spiritual realm (the world of the intangible) actually propels activities in the physical realm (the world of the tangible). The loss of this truth really is the basis for any disability. So, when Stephen Hawking said, "concentrate on the things your disability doesn't prevent you doing well and don't regret the things that it interferes with. Don't be disabled in spirit as well as physically", he was actually emphasizing the role that the spirit plays in our disability. Disability in the spirit can only beget more physical disability, but ability in the spirit will convert physical disabilities to these abilities. Turning disabilities into Theseabilities was the pursuit of Boye while he was with us and the best way to sustain his legacy is to keep the THESEABILITIES FOUNDATION alive. That's why we are gathered. The focus of THESEABILITIES FOUNDATION is "advocating the rights of persons with disabilities, emphasizing the need for inclusion!" The society in general has a label around people living with disabilities and have tended to sometimes regard them as misfits and outcasts. This marks the beginning of social exclusion which is a form of discrimination. Writing on inclusion, Busatto (2007) stated that, “Inclusion is community. No one becomes included by receiving handouts, even if these handouts are given by public bodies and with public resources. No one becomes included by being treated by a program in which they are no more than a number or a statistic. Inclusion is connection to the network of community development, it is to become more than a speck of dust, to have a forename and surname, with one’s own distinctive features, skills and abilities, able to receive and give stimulus, to imitate and be imitated, to participate in a process of changing one’s own life and collective life.“ A community is not one if it maintains the policy of exclusion. Such policies limit potentials and there is apparent loss on both sides - on the side of the strong, as well as the side of the weak; on the side of the capable, as well as the side of the disabled. Whereas the capable also have limitations to their optimum performance, which makes them disabled in some sense, the disabled who are allowed to demonstrate courage go ahead to rise above expectations. It thus appears that the two must freely exist in a symbiotic relationship. Those living with disabilities don't need handouts, what they need is the enabling environment to fulfill their potentials. They need to be recognized, to be involved in decisions that concerns them. The words of Robert M. Hensel, again, are instructive. Contributing to the discussion on inclusion, he says, "We, the ones who are challenged, need to be heard. To be seen not as a disability, but as a person who has and will continue to bloom. To be seen not only as a handicap, but as a well intact human being". To increase our capacity for being an inclusive society that caters for the needs of all citizens, including those living with disability, governments and the people must jettison all stereotypes and make spaces, especially public spaces accessible to all. The efforts of Boye Abioye and his like influenced the Lagos State Government to enact a law in 2010 compelling public buildings to be made accessible to all by providing ramps into such buildings. The Ministry of Physical Planning & Urban Development also made the same provision in its 2010 Law on Physical Planning and Urban Development, and has religiously implemented this provision. While in government, I was privileged to be part of the Committee that implemented the reallocation of car lots in favour of the physically challenged within the Government Secretariat in Alausa, making 5% of the parking lots available for the physically challenged, and ensuring that they are located closest to the entrances of buildings. But this is not a government thing alone, it is what concerns all of us. So, as a people, when we plan to put up structures we should ask ourselves if they will be accessible to everyone. As the structures extend vertically, we should ask ourselves what provisions we are making for the upper floors to be accessed. Elevators and Stair Lifts would easily provide these solutions. You never know, you may be the one in need of that help to access the facility. Additionally, as we build our houses, we should consider making the public spaces abutting our plots accessible by providing walkways that all kinds of people can access, off the roadways where the average motorist always threatens the pedestrian. Taking all of these measures cultivates an inclusive society, one in which everyone feels a sense of belonging who are not just mere numbers but are loved and given the opportunity to maximize their potentials. Those living with disabilities may indeed not be experiencing physical pains, but they may experience the emotional pain of exclusion, of being underrated and taken for granted. Their cry to the society is, we have our own abilities. We can do all things through Christ who strengthens us. It is the world out there that is living with limitations in their mindset. They see disabilities; we see Theseabilities. They think we are incapable, but we know we are capable in our own way. Just like when the world says there is a going down and we declare that there is a lifting up, so it is when the world sees disability, we see the reality of our situation. We do not see disability, we see reality. We choose to live in the reality, as victors, not vanquished. We live in our reality; we have no disabilities, we have Theseabilities. If Stephen Hawking overcame motor neuron disease to become one of the most admired scientists in Physics; Helen Keller - blind and deaf - became a political activist and celebrated author; John Nash suffered schizophrenia, yet produced outstanding works on geometry and partial differential equations; Christy Brown could only move his left foot of the whole body, but went ahead to become a celebrity author of "My Left Foot"; Demosthenes, a chronic stammerer became one of the most admired orators in history; our own Cobhams Asuquo, though blind is an international award-winning talented music producer and songwriter; Yinka Ayefele, paralyzed after a motor accident has continued to make waves as a musician and owner of a radio studio; Late Prophet Timothy Obadare proved that blindness was not a hindrance to becoming a famous international televangelist; and Idowu Akinrolabu (although late) became the only mouth artist in sub-Saharan Africa with world prizes won, it seems to me that it is those we consider as being capable (that is, without physical disability) who have to address the disability in their minds, and get exposed to the world of possibilities where disabilities become Theseabilities. They would then realize the need for inclusive communities where both the people with ability and those living with disability must collaborate to shake the world. Government therefore needs not create special schools for them but integrate them in the conventional school system with provision for a Department to take care of their needs. This will make others see them as part of the society. In furtherance of the pursuit of social inclusion, enlightenment programmes should be continually hosted to improve the mindsets of the physically disabled and the society at large on the reality of disability. I would like to end this with the story of Miriam Wawira, who lives in Nairobi. A lot of us are familiar with the story of Nick Vujicic, the Australian born without arms and legs, but Miriam is an African born without arms. Miriam agreed that it was the society that labeled the situation, regarding it as either a bad omen or a curse from the gods. She is happily married and has a child that she is able to cater for. She believes that she is just like any other human being, stating that she often does not remember that she doesn't have hands. The key to her successful living, according to her, is that she stopped being sorry for herself, accepted her reality and made use of what she had. She believes she's like any other person, but the question is, do other people think she is like them? This is the point where I think the problem actually lies with the larger society and the willingness to accept reality and see the physical challenged as normal people with special needs. Nick says, "I may not receive a miracle, but I could be the miracle for someone else". It is all about the purpose we are meant to fulfill. We will fulfill purpose with hope in our minds and love in our hearts for the physically challenged. We must change the narrative from pity to love, and from despair to hope. As I conclude, I appeal that we discount disability, accept our reality and live in the reality - a reality which confirms that with an open mind, a mind that is not disabled, we will sooner know that the world lies before us all (the able and the disabled) to conquer, and turn all disabilities to Theseabilities. Thank you. Tpl. Toyin Ayinde 0803 301 3849 toyinayinde@yahoo.co.uk