In order to show love and reach out to the less privileged in society which forms part of the Christmas celebrations, child-focused charity organisation, Pumpkins Foundation has organized a Christmas party dubbed “Yuletide Hangout“ for children living with Cerebral Palsy and their families.
The event which was held at the Mmofra Park at Dzorwulu in Accra, brought together families with “normal” kids and those with children with special needs, particularly, cerebral palsy children where they interacted and shared experiences.
Explaining the rationale behind the event in an interview with GhanaWeb, Executive Director of the Pumpkins Foundation, Baisiwa Dowuona Hammond said the event was organised to end the year on a good note and to thank God for his grace and care from the start of 2017.
She further explained that, “This meeting with our cerebral palsy friends is just for us to see how best we can begin to deal with the issue of stigma. If you know exactly what this condition brings, you’ll understand when we talk about stigma.”
According to Baisiwa Dowuona, society has for a long time, negatively branded families with children suffering from the cerebral palsy condition, hence the need to find ways to remove that stigma.
To this effect, she said bringing “families with normal kids” and those with cerebral palsy kids together will help eradicate the stigma.
Baisiwa Dowuona believes, eliminating the stigma will ensure families with cerebral palsy kids come out and seek help which are always available to them, so they can live better and normal lives.
“We have the so called normal families here kind of in an effort to mingle with the cerebral palsy families so that we can begin to work towards, if possible a stigma free society,” she explained.
She added that, her outfit will continue pushing for inclusion and advocating for social intervention projects for kids with special needs, so they can live better lives.
Pumpkins Foundation to embark on ‘community child care’ campaign in 2018
The Television Personality also disclosed that the Pumpkins Foundation will embark on several child care projects in 2018.
She said, the foundation will engage experts and visit communities in Ghana and educate care takers and parents on how to take care of children with special needs.
“We’re going to be moving into various communities with experts or people who are trained to take care of these children because they have special needs, to see exactly how we can engage parents or care givers in the best ways we can take care of these children,” she said.
Persons with Cerebral palsy must benefit from Disability Common Fund - Activist
President of the Cerebral Palsy Ghana, Providence Noyonyo, also appealed to government to fast-track the passage of the Mental Health Bill to help persons with mental health problems.
He wants individuals with cerebral palsy to benefit from in the Disability Common Fund.
“They should give opportunity to families with cerebral palsy children to also benefit from, social interventions such as the LEAP programme or the Disability Fund that goes to the various district assemblies,” he said.
