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Initiative for the Thriving of Persons with Disabilities

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Initiative for the Thriving of Persons with Disabilities

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A rights based, non profit organization committed to advancing the inclusion, dignity and full participation of persons with disabilities in the society.

15/10/2026

Today is White Cane Safety Day

Let us understand what the white cane actually represents.

It is not helplessness.
It is not dependency.
It is not an invitation to grab someone's arm without asking.

The white cane is a symbol of independence, navigation and freedom. 💜

For blind and visually impaired Nigerians, the white cane is a tool that enables independent movement through a world that was largely built without them in mind.

It is a statement, quiet but powerful that says:

"I am here. I am moving. I belong in this space." 🔥

On this White Cane Safety Day let us actively learn to:

✅ Never grab a blind person's arm or cane without asking — always offer assistance and wait for a response

✅ Keep pavements, walkways and public spaces clear of obstructions that endanger blind pedestrians

✅ Speak directly to a blind or visually impaired person not to their companion

✅ Respect the white cane as the navigational tool it is do not move it without permission

✅ Advocate for accessible infrastructure tactile pavements, audio signals at crossings and accessible public transport that makes Nigeria safer for every blind and visually impaired citizen

The white cane does not limit. It liberates. 💜

Share this post. Someone in your community needs to understand this today. 👇

14/10/2026

Today we are celebrating every Nigerian who reads the world through their fingertips. 💜

Braille is not a lesser form of literacy. It is not a workaround or a compromise.

It is a complete, sophisticated system of reading and writing developed by Louis Braille in 1824 that has given millions of blind and visually impaired people across the world full access to the written word.

In Nigeria, access to Braille materials remains deeply inadequate:

🔹 Most Nigerian schools lack Braille textbooks and learning materials
🔹 Government documents, healthcare information and civic materials are almost never available in Braille
🔹 Braille literacy training is inconsistently available across states
🔹 Many blind Nigerians reach adulthood without ever learning to read

This is not just an education failure.

It is an access failure.

A rights failure. 🔥

On this National Braille Week ITPD is calling for:
✅ Braille materials in every Nigerian school serving blind and visually impaired students
✅ Government documents and public health information available in Braille
✅ Braille literacy training as a standard component of disability support services in Nigeria

Every Nigerian deserves to read.

Every Nigerian deserves access to information.

Share this post for every blind and visually impaired Nigerian who deserves better access. 👇

12/10/2026

This week is Dyspraxia Awareness Week —

This disability is widely misunderstood in Nigeria.

Dyspraxia is also knows as Developmental Coordination Disorder, it affects how the brain processes information to produce movement and coordination.

It is a lifelong condition that affects approximately 1 in 20 people globally.
In Nigeria, many children and adults living with dyspraxia have never received a diagnosis. Instead they have been labelled:
🔹 Clumsy
🔹 Lazy
🔹 Careless
🔹 Slow
🔹 Not trying hard enough

None of those labels are accurate. None of them are fair. And every single one of them causes damage that outlasts childhood. 🔥

Dyspraxia affects coordination, movement, organisation, memory and social skills — but it does not affect intelligence. Many people with dyspraxia are highly creative, deeply empathetic and remarkably resilient.

What they need is not correction. What they need is understanding. 💜

ITPD is calling on Nigerian parents, teachers, healthcare workers and communities to:

✅ Learn to recognise the signs of dyspraxia in children and adults
✅ Replace labels with curiosity — ask why, not what is wrong
✅ Advocate for occupational therapy and support services in Nigerian schools
✅ Create spaces where different ways of moving through the world are respected

Different wiring. Same worth. Always. 💜
Share this post — someone in your community needs to read this today. 👇

01/10/2026

As we celebrate Nigeria's independence today, we should know that a truly independent Nigeria is one where every citizen regardless of ability can access the full promise of that independence. 🔥

This isn't our reality yet!

Happy New Month Initiative for the Thriving of Persons with Disabilities family

30/09/2026

Wow!

19/09/2026

To our dear Habiba Okoli Habiba Okoli ,a strong behind the scene pillar of Initiative for the Thriving of Persons with Disabilities, we love you and we wish you many more prosperous and healthy years ahead.

Happy birthday Ma*am

15/09/2026

Today is the International Day of Democracy!

Democracy is built on one foundational idea:

Every citizen's voice matters equally.

Not some citizens.

Not citizens without disabilities.

Not citizens who can climb the stairs to the polling booth.

Not citizens who can read the ballot without assistance.

Not citizens who can stand in a queue for three hours.

Every.
Single.
Citizen. 🔥

Earlier this year Initiative for the Thriving of Persons with Disabilities ran a PVC sensitization campaign that took us into communities, onto the streets and into the office of the Resident Electoral Commissioner of INEC Abia State because we believed that persons with disabilities deserve a seat at Nigeria's democratic table.

Not as an afterthought.

Not as a special accommodation.

As citizens.

Full stop. 💜

On this International Day of Democracy, ITPD is calling on Nigeria to ask itself honestly:

🔹 Are our polling units physically accessible to persons with disabilities?

🔹 Are ballot materials available in formats that persons with visual impairments can use?

🔹 Are sign language interpreters available for deaf voters?

🔹 Are persons with intellectual disabilities supported at the point of voting?

🔹 Is Nigeria's democracy truly democratic if millions of its citizens with disabilities cannot fully participate in it?

A democracy that excludes persons with disabilities is not a full democracy.

It is a democracy with an asterisk. 🔥

We will keep pushing until that asterisk is gone. 💜

Share this post.

Tag INEC Nigeria.

Tag your representative.

Democracy belongs to all of us. 👇

08/09/2026

Today is being celebrated globally as International Literacy Day.

We are reminded of the importance of literacy as a matter of dignity and human rights.

While reading and writing is a pillar of literacy, it goes well beyond that. Literacy is much more than just reading and writing. It is the capacity to understand, interpret, create, and communicate using printed, spoken, and digital materials.

A person with a disability must have the right opportunity to learn and be able to communicate and navigate their way socially, culturally and otherwise.

I'll leave you with thee profound words of a wise man called Frederick Douglass "Once you learn to read, you will be forever free."

04/09/2026

Let's close this week's conversation with something we want every person with a disability in Nigeria to carry with them.

Your body is your own!

It is not your family's own for them to make decisions about without your presence and approval!

Not your doctor's to assume things about without asking!

Not your community's to define by its own discomfort!

Not society's to erase from the conversation about desire, love, relationships and reproductive choice!

Yours!!!! 🔥

You have the right to sexual and reproductive health information that is accessible, accurate and relevant to your specific needs.

You have the right to make informed decisions about your body, including decisions about relationships, contraception, pregnancy and parenthood.

You have the right to healthcare providers who treat you as a whole person not a diagnosis that cancels your humanity.

You have the right to be in this conversation. 💜

02/09/2026

📢 On Monday we named the silence.

Today Initiative for the Thriving of Persons with Disabilities (ITPD) is naming what lives inside it. 💜

These are the assumptions that persons with disabilities in Nigeria encounter in hospitals, in families, in communities, in relationships often without anyone ever saying them out loud. But felt. Deeply and repeatedly felt.

"People with disabilities are not sexual beings."

Wrong!

Disability does not cancel desire, attraction, feeling or the fundamental human need for intimacy and connection. 🔥

"Their bodies are not fully theirs to decide about."

Wrong!

Every person with a disability regardless of the nature of their disability has the right to make informed decisions about their own body. Full stop!!!!

"A woman with a disability who becomes pregnant must have been taken advantage of."

Wrong!!

She made a choice. Her body. Her right. Her decision.

Assuming otherwise strips her of her humanity.

"Disability and parenthood are incompatible."
Wrong!

Persons with disabilities are parents loving, capable, present parents across Nigeria and across the world every single day.

At ITPD we believe that sexual and reproductive health and rights including body autonomy, informed consent, access to reproductive healthcare and the right to relationships and parenthood belong to every person with a disability.

Not conditionally. Not partially. Fully and without exception. 💜

Which of these assumptions have you encountered?

Tell us in the comments. 👇

Address

Sammy's House, Umuosh/Laguru, Ubakala, Umuahia/
Umuahia

Telephone

+2349169670062

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