Organizations working on behalf of hearing-impaired people in Uganda have urged public and commercial institutions to make it easier for the deaf to access information reports local Daily Monitor news website.
An estimated one million people are deaf in Uganda, according to the Initiative for Social and Economic Rights (ISER).
The organisation urged the government to integrate sign language into teachers’ training as a way of dealing with the shortage of people with the skill.
“If we integrate sign language into the teachers’ training, then what you are doing is rolling out teachers that know sign language so that the teacher will be able to sign for a deaf student, likewise to doctors, nurses, police officers, and court, among others,” said Elizabeth Atori from ISER.
The head of the Uganda National Association of the Deaf added that people with hearing impairment were often neglected by the media.
He praised the police for using a sign language interpreter during their briefings but criticized the media for ignoring them.
“The issue of sign language interpretation is within the justice law and order sector, and we appreciate that police have one sign language interpreter in the entire country but also what media houses do is during the police press briefing, you people cut off our sign language interpreter,” Robert Nkwangu told journalists.