Sign and support their right to live in the community!

Groups of people with disabilities in a country called Croatia have a paper which says that the government should make sure that all people with disabilities can live in the community. They ask people who agree to what the paper says to sign this paper. They need a lot of people to sign this paper. They will show these signatures to the government and they will ask the government to take action. You can sign this paper online here.

A coalition of seven organisations of people with disabilities, together with the Human Rights Center, have launched a petition urging decision makers to proceed with the full implementation of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, with a particular focus on Article 19, setting out the right of all people with disabilities to live in the community.

The coalition, called Platform 19, "urges all political decision-makers to put an end to institutionalization by investing in the development of community-based alternatives. The human rights of all people with disabilities must be respected and their equal status with other citizens must be ensured."

The coalition argues that people with disabilities "face social exclusion more often than other citizens, and among people with disabilities those with intellectual and/or psycho-social disabilities are most often institutionalized and removed from the community".

The development of support services within the community would facilitate social inclusion of these vulnerable groups of citizens. According to the statment of the Coalition,"the vast majority of people with disabilities in Croatia have no appropriate support to live in the community and almost 8,000 people live in institutions, segregated from society."

The petition recalls the basic principles of equal rights and social justice recognised by the Croatian constitutional system to ask for better inclusion of people with disabilities in the community. The international agreements ratified by Croatia in 2007 (United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and its Optional Protocol, together with the Joint Memorandum on Social Inclusion of the Republic of Croatia in the process of accession to the EU) provide also a legal basis committing Croatian government to take action in this field.

The Coalition is planning to meet with all decision-makers at local and national level within the first stage of this project. These meetings involve national MP’s from all political parties and representatives from 31 local governments. The launch of a public campaign at national level is foreseen in the second stage.

Inclusion Europe welcomes the initiative of Platform 19 claiming for the basic right of people with disabilities to live included in society and encourages its members as well as general public to support and disseminate this petition. The rights of all people with disabilities must be respected and decision makers must provide the measures to put these rights into action.

Click here to sign the petition online.

Source: Association for Self Advocacy, Croatia