BAGUIOREG (Eng)
AKP/july-21-2015

Baguio City is celebrating the 37^th National Disability Prevention and Rehabilitation Week. One of the highlights was the special registration for voters with disability.

Eleven P-W-Ds and 12 senior citizens registered last Friday at the SM Mall, one of dozens of off-site registration venues around the country.

First quarter records from Comelec Baguio show that only 167 PWDs have registered. Census estimates more than 3,000 P-W-Ds in the city as of 2010.

Election Officer John Paul Martin says there are still about 8,000 registered voters in the city who have yet to update their biometrics.

(end)

BAGUIOREG (Fil)
AKP/july-21-2015

Nagsagawa ng special registration para sa mga may kapansanan ang Comelec Baguio.

Ito ay ginanap bilang paggunita ng ika-37 National Disability Prevention and Rehabilitation week na nagsimula noong Hulyo 17.

May 11 P-W-D at 12 senior citizens ang nagparehistro noong Biyernes sa SM mall. Nasa 167 pa lang ang bilang ng mga P-W-D na nag-rehistro sa Comelec sa unang tatlong buwan ng 2015.

Base sa 2010 census, mahigit 3,000 ang naninirahang P-W-D sa Baguio.

Ayon kay Election Officer John Paul Martin, may mga 8,000 pang mga botante sa Baguio ang wala pang biometrics.

(end)

By RONN BAUTISTA and KRIXIA SUBINGSUBING

(First of two parts)

SUPPERTIME in the Philippines is often accompanied by the start of local primetime newscasts in Filipino homes.

At 6:30 p.m., media networks ABS-CBN, GMA-7 and TV-5 begin broadcasting their flagship news programs.

While the rest of the country follows the rundown of the day’s newsworthy events, a significant part of the population will not understand a single thing that anchormen will say: the Deaf community.

Despite laws and international conventions encouraging them to do so, most private TV networks continue to deny information to Deaf persons by opting not to include regular sign language insets during their daily newscasts over logistical and aesthetic concerns.

Republic Act 7277 or the Magna Carta for Persons with Disabilities (PWDs) states that “television stations (are) encouraged to provide a sign language inset in at least one newscast program a day.”

This is in line with the United Nations Convention on Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPWD), which the country is a signatory of, that acknowledges the right of PWDs to “receive and impart information and ideas on an equal basis with others.”

At least 500,000 Filipinos are deaf or have difficulty hearing, according to the De La Salle-College of Saint Benilde School of Deaf Education and Applied Studies (DLS-CSB SDEAS).

“(Deaf persons) need valuable information to make informed decisions. Every bit of information has the potential to be life-changing for them,” said DLS-CSB SDEAS Dean Veronica Templo-Perez.

Despite recognizing the merit of such measures, media giants ABS-CBN and GMA-7 opt not to implement provisions in the Magna Carta for PWDs and the UNCRPWD on accessibility to deaf persons as insets have yet to be prioritized in the newsroom agenda.

Assessment of top 3 PH broadcasting stations. Sign language insets are a staple feature in special coverages, but have yet to become a regular part of newscast programs for ABS-CBN and GMA-7.

“(GMA) has yet to make sign language insets a priority because usually if it’s an urgent need, you would hear from the sectors. We are studying how to make it a regular part of our programming,” said Howie Severino, GMA-7’s Vice President for Professional Development, in Filipino.

Severino added that making insets regular additions to news programs would also entail large changes in the newsroom such as hiring sign language interpreters and finding additional space in the studio for them.

Arlan Alfonso, head of ABS-CBN News Engineering, echoed the same sentiment, saying that adding sign language insets in newscasts would require several aesthetic adjustments to avoid screen clutter.

“(Insets) would definitely eat up the video. We have a running news crawl, we have graphics, we have a logo—when you put a deaf interpreter inset, you have to adjust our boxes to give way to other elements of the screen, and that could distract from the information we are trying to provide,” Alfonso said.

Even resolving aesthetic concerns, the needs of the station’s wider and primary audience have to be considered as well, said Francis Toral, head of ABS-CBN Breaking News and Live Events.

“We can and we are considering the needs of the Deaf community, (but) we are not yet implementing sign language because our wider audience has no need for it,” she said.

As of April this year, both networks enjoy the bulk of Philippine viewership with an average audience share of 42 percent for ABS-CBN and 37 percent for GMA-7, according to Kantar Media.

Hesitation to use insets means failing to hear out the Deaf community’s need for information, Templo-Perez said.

“How about the actual need to provide information to an audience who cannot get accurate and important in any other way than a sign language inset in a news program?” she asked.

Last February, Sen. Paolo “Bam” Aquino filed Senate Bill 2117 which seeks to amend the original Magna Carta and require all free-to-air TV stations to include sign language insets in at least one newscast a day.

“The term ‘encouraged’ (in the original Magna Carta) is very weak compared to actually requiring networks (to include insets),” said Randy Calsena, officer of the National Council on Disability Affairs subcommittee on laws and policymaking.

So far, only TV-5, the youngest of the three major broadcasting networks in the Philippines, includes insets in their newscasts.

In partnership with the Philippine National Association of Sign Language Interpreters since 2011, TV-5 provides insets in two of its flagship national news programs, Aksyon sa Tanghali and Aksyon Prime, which airs weeknights at 6:15 p.m.

“We recognize that there is a need for wider access to our newscast programs, especially for the PWD sector. (It’s) not a question of cost, it’s a question of how willing you are to (provide for insets),” Patrick Paez, production head of TV-5, said.

Although TV-5 follows the Magna Carta, the station may still need to make its sign language insets more accessible, Templo-Perez said.

The network’s inset takes up less than one-forty-eighth of the screen.

Acceptable sign language insets specs. Following the standard aspect ratio (4:3) for newscast programs in the Philippines, if a four-by-three grid is drawn across a television screen, an accessible inset should take up one-ninth, or roughly 1 by 0.33 squares, according to DLS-CSB SDEAS. In the United Kingdom, where most channels are in 16:9, insets must occupy one-sixth of the screen, or roughly 4.50 by 5.33 squares.

The DLS-CSB SDEAS estimated that insets should take up at least one-ninth of the screen for deaf audiences to clearly comprehend the sign language interpreter’s actions.

International standards, such as the United Kingdom Independent Television Commission’s guidelines, set an even higher bar at one-sixth of the screen allotted for the inset. As for SB 2118, the Senate has yet to discuss the standards for the insets.

“Let us remember that providing sign language insets are for the benefit of the Deaf community, not for the viability of TV stations,” Templo-Perez said.

SB 2118 has been pending at the Senate Committee on Public Information for more than a year.

The House of Representatives passed its counterpart, House Bill 1214, in February last year.

Should the bills become law, both ABS-CBN and GMA-7 said they will comply when given enough time.

“Needless to say, if required by law, we will abide,” Toral said.

However, such vow and recognition of the importance of accessibility seemed ironic for Templo-Perez given the two station’s continued lack of sign language insets.

“How sad that it takes a law to get them to comply,” she said.

Conclusion: Deafening silence: Budget woes hamper state TV accessibility to deaf persons

(The authors are journalism majors of the University of the Philippines-Diliman. They submitted this story for the journalism seminar class “Reporting on Persons with Disabilities” under VERA Files trustee Yvonne T. Chua. This series of stories coincides with the celebration of the country’s National Disability Prevention and Rehabilitation Week.)

SPRJULY (Eng)
AKP/july-21-2015

While special registrations in malls are more accessible to P-W-Ds, deaf registrants are not receiving sufficient assistance.

Lawyer Jessica Magbanua of P-W-D group AKAP-Pinoy says the Commission on Elections has to coordinate efforts in assisting those who need sign language interpreters.

During the special registration at SM malls in Manila last Friday, there were sign language interpreters in help desks.

But election personnel were not aware of their presence even if it was the Comelec itself that tapped organizations to help out.

The Link Center for the Deaf and Miriam College-Southeast Asian Institute for the Deaf provided interpreters in malls.

(end)

SPRJULY (Fil)
AKP/july-21-2015

Madali mang puntahan ng mga P-W-D ang special registration sa mall, hindi naman nakakatanggap ng tamang tulong ang mga bingi.

Ayon kay Atty Jessica Magbanua ng AKAP-Pinoy, kulang sa koordinasyon ang Comelec sa pagbibigay ng sign language interpreters.

Isang halimbawa nito ay ang naganap na special registration sa mga SM malls sa Maynila nitong Biyernes.

Hindi alam ng mga election officers na mayroon palang mga sign language interpreters na galing Link Center for the Deaf at Miriam College-Southeast Asian Institute for the Deaf.

Hindi tuloy nabigyan ng tulong ang maraming bingi na nais magrehistro.
(end)

By RONN BAUTISTA and KRIXIA SUBINGSUBING

(Conclusion)

IN the Philippines, sign language insets in free-to-air television channels are almost unheard of.

Out of Metro Manila’s 18 channels, only one features a sign language interpreter alongside its news programs. Citing logistical and aesthetic concerns, most private TV networks hesitate to include insets in their newscasts despite Republic Act 7277 or the Magna Carta for Persons with Disabilities (PWDs) encouraging them to do so.

“Because (private) networks still do not perceive the need (to cater to deaf audiences), the government’s own TV station should lead as an example to the industry,” said Randy Calsena, officer of the National Council for Disability Affairs’ subcommittee on laws and policymaking.

However, state-owned People’s Television (PTV-4) has also failed to implement its operator’s own laws. From declining government subsidy to unstable revenues, budget woes hinder PTV-4 from making its broadcasts fully accessible to the Deaf community as well.

Since its establishment during the Marcos regime, the PTV-4 charter requires the station to “maintain a broadcast industry system that serves as a vital link for participative democracy and effective government information dissemination through developmental communication.”

As a state-owned station, PTV-4 is bound by both the country’s Magna Carta and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of PWDs (UNCRPD) to ensure information is usable and accessible to Deaf persons.

Section 9 of the UNCRPWD declares that state parties “shall take appropriate measures to ensure access (for PWDs), on an equal basis with others, to information and communications.”

“Sign language insets are important because Deaf persons cannot access information in a verbal manner. PWDs have as much right to that as everyone else,” Calsena said.

Yet, since the 1990s, PTV-4 has never included sign language insets during any of its programs except for one instance during the preparation of President Benigno Aquino III’s State of the Nation Address in 2012.

“That was part of the former news division head’s conceptualization of news programs, but it was never followed up because he had to leave,” PTV-4 News Division Head Ramon Nunez said in Filipino.

Now that Nunez holds that position, the news head said he has been consulting his department about the feasibility of regular sign language insets. During informal consultations, one of his colleagues raised concern over the funding for such an addition to the newsroom.

When PTV-4 hired an interpreter in 2012, it cost the station P2,500. To make it a regular addition to PTV-4’s broadcasts in line with the Magna Carta for PWDs, Nunez said the network would have to hire at least two interpreters a day.

“To cut costs, we would hire interpreters as contractuals with no benefits like GSIS and PAG-IBIG (coverage),” Nunez said in Filipino.

Although the station management will decide the length of contract and final salaries of each interpreter, entry-level contractual employees in PTV-4 receive around P12,000 monthly.

“(Adding regular sign language insets) requires hiring new employees which entails additional budget,” Nunez said.

On top of the subsidy it receives from the national government, Section 19 of the PTV-4 charter states that “the Network (may) generate funds from advertising and airtime sales for its operations and capital expenditure program.”

Figure 1: Budget and expenses breakdown. Before President Benigno Aquino III’s term, state subsidy to PTV-4 dramatically decreased while the station tried to cut down its expenses from 2008 to 2010.

From 2011 onward, the station’s sales revenue can only fund as much as half of PTV-4’s annual expenses

Excluding funding from the national government, PTV-4 has been incurring hundreds of millions of pesos in losses from 2008 to 2013.

Figure 2: Insufficient revenues. After 2010, PTV-4 needed an average state subsidy of P140 million annually to augment its sales revenues.

When including erratic state subsidy, the station’s finances has only begun levelling out in 2012.

Figure 3: Breaking even. PTV-4’s finances crashed to as much as P139 million in losses in 2010 and only began stabilizing in 2012.

Such financial situation has seen the station’s budget for personal services, or employee salaries, to gradually decrease from P181 million to P118 million in 2013.

“If we hire interpreters again, we cannot rely on our programs’ advertisements alone. We create programs to serve the people, not only to raise revenue,” Nunez said.

A solution to PTV-4’s budget woes may now lie in a Senate bill filed last February which sought to require all free-to-air TV networks, including state television, to include sign language insets during newscasts.

Section 14 of Sen. Paolo “Bam” Aquino’s Senate Bill 2118 states that additional costs that the government may incur, such as PTV-4s’ budget for interpreters, will be sourced from the 1 percent appropriation earmarked for PWD welfare in the national budget.

“It’s important that the government incorporates a budget in every agency, not just PTV, for making services accessible to PWDs because access to information is one way of empowering the people,” Calsena said.

Given different sources of funding, Nunez said he has yet to recommend and present the feasibility of sign language insets during newscasts, but promised to raise it “as soon as possible.”

“It’s about time we do something about this. Kasi kapag hindi namin ginawa ‘yun, parang iniiwan na rin namin ang mga PWDs. Sama-sama dapat sa pag-unlad (If we don’t do anything, it would be a disservice to PWDs. We need to achieve progress together),” Nunez said.

First part: Deafening silence: Private TV stations opt against using sign language insets 

(The authors are journalism majors of the University of the Philippines-Diliman. They submitted this story for the journalism seminar class “Reporting on Persons with Disabilities” under VERA Files trustee Yvonne T. Chua. This series of stories coincides with the celebration of the country’s National Disability Prevention and Rehabilitation Week.)

Text and video by GRAZIELLE CHUA and VERLIE RETULIN

AS a Deaf student, Ana Kristina Arce had to transfer from one school to another, trying to find the best one to accommodate her needs—a costly undertaking that consumed both her time and effort.

Now a professor at the De La Salle-College of Saint Benilde (DLS-CSB)’s School of Deaf Education and Applied Studies (SDEAS), she joins other members of the Deaf community in advocating for the declaration of the Filipino Sign Language (FSL) as the national sign language for the Filipino Deaf, recognizing it as the language of their identity and that which will allow them greater access to education.

“There is a struggle for language development here in the Philippines. Having a national language for the deaf, and using this in the K to 12 would be such a big help in learning. I really think it is best that the national sign language for the deaf is FSL,” Arce said.

The appropriate medium of instruction to be used in educating deaf students, however, is not the only concern posed by Deaf advocates. The problem with deaf education in the country also has to do with the availability of instructional materials, teacher preparedness and environmental accessibility. All these factors require attention in the long run, especially to ensure that education is inclusive.

Arce cited the lack of interpreters, insufficient training of teachers, and the exclusion of deaf students from the mainstream—with outright disregard for their needs—as some of the barriers that had hindered her access to a proper education.

As a kid, she was enrolled in several oral schools in an effort to make her speak. She admits, however, that she was a slow learner in oralism. She was not picking up her lessons nor was she learning to speak well.

So her parents decided to transfer her to a mainstream setup, where she got to interact with hearing students. The school, however, lacked an interpreter to facilitate her learning. “The teacher would just be speaking, and I would not understand what was going on,” she said.

Ana Kristina Arce of SDEAS

Arce then moved to another public school where total communication (speaking and signing done simultaneously) was the means of communication used from primary to secondary level. However, she said there were times when the teacher would speak too fast and the interpreter—who was using Signed Exact English (SEE)—would fail to catch up. They were not provided with note takers, either.

Then in her third year, she realized that the same lessons were being taught. Oftentimes, these only required memorization and failed to hone her other skills—reading, in particular.

John Baliza, also a professor at SDEAS, said most of the Deaf students he has taught were falling behind in terms of learning and blames this on the practice of teachers making them just copy notes from the blackboard back in elementary and high school. Ultimately, he said, they survived basic education by memorizing facts.

“The challenge is how to help them unlearn the wrong facts they learned in elementary and high school, and how we can fit in four years…new learnings that they should have (already) learned,” he explains.

Arce said she also experienced exclusion and discrimination in group activities and even from school teachers and officials.

“Everyone in that school did not know how to sign. We would have to bring paper and pen to communicate, to write to each other. There is no access. There were barriers to learning,” she said.

Enshrined in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCPRD) is a mandate to all State Parties, including the Philippines, to ensure an inclusive education system for PWDs at all levels. Specifically, it mandates State Parties to facilitate the learning of sign language and the promotion of the linguistic identity of the Deaf community.

Therese Bustos, Deaf education specialist from the University of the Philippines Diliman

This provision forms the basis for House Bill 450 or the “The Filipino Sign Language Act of 2012,” which seeks to designate FSL the medium of official communication in all transactions involving the Deaf and the language of instruction of deaf education. It envisions FSL as the medium of instruction in all national and local agencies involved in the education of the deaf.

Alliance of Concerned Teachers party-list Rep. Antonio Tinio said, however, only a few special education (SPED) teachers have been trained to use FSL. Others use the American Sign Language (ASL), SEE, and other sign systems when teaching.

Once enacted into law, the bill will include FSL as a separate subject in the curriculum of training programs for teachers in Deaf education. It will also promote the licensing of Deaf teachers as users of FSL.

“One thing the bill wants to address is to have more deaf teachers educating deaf students,” Tinio said.

To improve the quality of teachers in Deaf education, the bill also proposes periodic trainings and evaluation programs.

“There are a lot of things that we need to change, starting with teacher training and education. Some things need to be reviewed and changed in the teacher training curriculum,” Tinio said.

Therese Bustos, Deaf education specialist from the University of the Philippines Diliman, agrees, saying the sign language to be used as medium of instruction must not only work for the teachers but more so for the deaf students.

Bustos said most deaf educators today are trained using SEE because of their familiarity with the English language, making the sign language easier to learn. Its advantage stems from deaf students’ proficiency with written English.

However, in her 10 years of experience in handling deaf kids, Bustos said a student’s ability to write well in English does not depend only in SEE, but also on their learning environment.

English words in FSL

She said most students who write well in English had tutors, parents who checked their homework, and teachers who took their teaching responsibilities seriously.

“What we are seeing now is that it does not matter whether FSL or SEE was used. What matters was being part of the environment where education is important,” Bustos said.

Republic Act 7277 or the Magna Carta for Persons with Disabilities, which was amended by Republic Act 10524, requires the State to consider the special requirements of PWDs in formulating education policies and program, and encourages learning institutions to take into account the special needs of PWDs such as the use of school facilities, class schedules and physical education requirements.

At present, the K to 12 program of the Department of Education recognizes FSL as the medium of instruction to be used in educating deaf students in the mother-tongue-based multilingual education (MTB-MLE) from kindergarten to Grade 3.

Bustos, who is also a member of the Deaf Education Council (DEC) tasked by DepEd to look into issues in deaf education, said inclusion on FSL in the mother tongue curriculum shows that DepEd recognizes the language used by the Deaf community in accordance with the UNCRPD. It will also raise awareness among teachers that sign language is also a language that should be used as a medium of instruction, she said.

“We are thankful for DepEd because…the mere act of incorporating that single page into the curriculum took a lot of work,” Bustos said.

But she said the road map toward multi-literacy among deaf students is still a work in progress.

“How do we transition from what is mandated by the law and declared in the curriculum to get to a point wherein it’s true on paper and true on reality? Our (next) task is to map that out,” Bustos said.

Deaf advocates push for more inclusive education system video script

 (The authors are journalism majors of the University of the Philippines-Diliman. They submitted this story for the journalism seminar class “Reporting on Persons with Disabilities” under VERA Files trustee Yvonne T. Chua.)

Czarinah Mercado in her festival costume during the awarding ceremony of Miss Philippines on Wheels, Signs and Vision 2013.

By YVETTE B. MORALES

CZARINAH Mercado was nervous. It was her first time to stand before a huge crowd. Clad in a persimmon dress made by a famous Filipino designer, she knew all eyes were on her.

Only she couldn’t see them.

Guided by a white cane, Mercado confidently strutted down the runway to show off not only her dress but also her advocacy.

Modelling in the prestigious Philippine Fashion Week (PhFW) in May 2014 was a dream come true for Mercado. She and Arjhessa Espiritu became the first two models with visual disability to join the biannual event that showcases the works of famous Filipino designers.

Mercado was born with microphthalmia, a condition where one or both eyeballs are smaller than the regular. In some cases, children with microphthalmia can have limited sight. Mercado was partially blind as a child and now has weakened vision.

The 2000 census identified low vision as the most common disability in the country, accounting for 37 percent of about 942,000 persons with disabilities. This was followed by partial blindness at 8 percent.

Mercado is lucky to have seen every color; her favorite shades are hues of pink and purple. But with weakened vision, she said, “I can recognize bright colors better.”

Like most people her age, she grew up being glued to the television. The shows did not only entertain her, they also made her dream of modelling dresses and joining beauty pageants.

“I imagined myself standing on the stage, surrounded by a huge audience (performing, and then answering judges’ questions). I like that feeling,” she said.

Before the PhFW last year, Mercado was an active member of Ambassadors of Light, a choir composed mostly of persons with visual disability. Even as a singer, Mercado would always pray for opportunities in other areas not only for herself, but for fellow PWDs as well.

A framed online news article and photo of Mercado’s Philippine Fashion Week 2014 appearance is displayed in their home.

“Usually, music is the only opportunity not only for blind people but also for other PWDs,” she said.

The United Nations Convention on the Rights of PWDs, to which the Philippines is a signatory, aims to “ensure and promote the full realization of all human rights and fundamental freedoms for all persons with disabilities without discrimination of any kind on the basis of disability.” This includes the right to participation to cultural life, recreation, leisure and sport.

Indeed, Mercado’s was an answered prayer.

In November 2013, she placed second in the first Miss Philippines on Wheels, Signs and Vision organized by Tahanang Walang Hagdan and Women with Disabilities Leap to Social and Economic Progress, advocacy organizations aiming to enhance the lives of PWDs, focusing on people with orthopaedic disability and women with disabilities, respectively.

The pageant, unlike the traditional beauty contests, does not only look for the most beautiful and talented PWD, but also one who can best represent the sectors and showcase her talents to people without disabilities.

Despite the special awards she took home, Mercado said the preparations did not go as planned. The human props who were supposed to enact Taylor Swift’s “Speak Now” had an emergency.

“I just looked for people who can replace them, and we only rehearsed the night before (the pageant). I never expected to win Best in Talent that time,” she said.

In addition to being her winning piece, the song is one of her favorites as, she said, it reflects her personality.

“I picture out a world where everyone tells the truth, or aren’t afraid of what they’re doing, as long as it’s right. I think it would be a better place,” she said.

“Speak Now” tells the story of a woman who decided to take her possibly last chance at true love by objecting in a wedding. Eventually, the groom ran away with her after she told him her feelings, thus giving the song a happy-ever-after ending.

Mercado also bagged two more special awards in that pageant: Best in Festival Costume and Miss Personality in Visions.

But her answered prayers did not stop with the pageant. Through the collaboration of Nationwide Organization of Visually Impaired Empowered Ladies (NOVEL), Philippine Blind Union and PhFW organizer Runway Productions, Mercado landed in the catwalk of the prestigious event with Espiritu, who placed first in the same pageant she joined.

NOVEL is a young organization that aims to empower women with visual impairments while the PBU is a national federation of people with visual disabilities.

“It was an overwhelming responsibility. We focused our minds on the fact that we’re doing it for the PWD community, to show people that we are not limited by our disabilities,” Mercado said.

Contrary to stereotypical models, there were neither diet tricks nor skin enhancements for Mercado.

“We’re just on our best. We took the confidence and the lessons we got from the pageant,” she said.

Mercado said she did not even have the chance to try the runway except a day before the show.

“We asked if we could roam around the place just so we can estimate how big it is,” she said.

On May 31, 2014, she confidently conquered the catwalk in an orange belted dress designed by Audie Espino and Lyle Ibanez. Although she did not get the chance to talk to her co-models, their unspoken encouragements lifted her spirits.

Mercado laughs while sharing her experience in the Philippine Fashion Week 2014.

“I didn’t know what was going on their minds. But before and after the show, someone said their (co-models) faces say, ‘You can do it,’” she said.

A year after the exhilarating experience, Mercado conquered another stage. Instead of a dress or a gown, this time she wore a black toga as she marched to get her undergraduate diploma on Business Management in STI Fairview. She nows works as a telemarketer at a software company in Quezon City.

Despite seeming to be poles apart, Mercado’s chosen professional path and her past as a model coincide in terms of interacting with other people: something the self-proclaimed extrovert has always loved.

Regardless of her exposure to the world measured by physical attributes and style preferences, Mercado said what others see does not really matter.

“When you’re sighted, it’s easy to judge. You neglect people when they don’t meet your standards. That’s the reason why people miss out on the things we can still discover: only by judging, and expecting something far from reality,” she said.

Instead of being a disability, Mercado claimed visual impairment could actually be an advantage.

“We get to know (people) without judgment: We don’t care whether they have dirty nails, a dark complexion, or are fat. We focus on their character, not by what they can give us.”

Having said that, Mercado proudly introduced the most beautiful woman for her.

“The prettiest woman is me. You don’t have the right to ask others to believe in you when you yourself doubt it,” she said.

(The author is a journalism major of the University of the Philippines-Diliman. She submitted this story for the journalism seminar class “Reporting on Persons with Disabilities” under VERA Files trustee Yvonne T. Chua.)

Wheelchair user Sofronio Floro is one of the homeowners in Davao City’s ADAP Village, a community of PWDs that provides livelihood opportunities for members through cooperativism. Photo by JOHN FRANCES C. FUENTES

Text and photos by JOHN FRANCES C. FUENTES

DAVAO CITY — Wheelchair user Sofronio Floro, 54, has carefully assembled an armchair, one of the hundreds he and his fellow workers with disabilities have made the past couple of days.

The armchairs and desks will be shipped hundreds of miles away from the city — to the Department of Education (DepEd) Central Office in Manila, and will be distributed to public schools.

The tables and chairs will be used by students who probably will never know that they were handcrafted by people with disabilities (PWDs) living in a village in Davao.

Located 14 kilometers from downtown Davao is the Association of Differently-Abled Persons (ADAP) Village, a community of PWDs that provides livelihood opportunities for members through cooperativism.

Built around a 9,601-square-meter lot in Indangan, Buhangin, the community was set up with the support of the Lions Club and Habitat for Humanity. PWD members of ADAP also helped in the construction of the 40 housing units in the village.

Through the famed “bayanihan” spirit, the PWDs lined up and passed concrete blocks to one another going to the construction site.

“It was what we call as our sweat equity,” said Alicia M. Fabiaña, manager of ADAP Multi-purpose Cooperative, whose members include the residents of ADAP Village.

Fabiaña, a person with post-polio syndrome, said 75 members of the cooperative qualified for the housing project but only 40 houses have so far been built. The rest of the members have yet to construct their houses on the 70- to 80- square-meter lot allotted per unit, she explained, adding that the residents pay P180 to P250 per month for 25 years as their monthly amortization.

ADAP members who have no houses of their own, especially those who are married, were given priority in the housing project. They have sought the help of the National Housing Authority for the purchase of the land.

The ADAP Village is probably what the framers of the Magna Carta for Persons with Disabilities had in mind when they penned its Section 39, which says, “The National Government shall take into consideration in its shelter program the special housing requirement of disabled persons.”

Alicia M. Fabiaña, manager of ADAP Multi-purpose Cooperative, whose members include the residents of ADAP Village. Photo by JOHN FRANCES C. FUENTES

Sections 40 and 41 also talk about the role of local government, national agencies and nongovernment organizations in providing livelihood opportunities and vocational rehabilitation measures for PWDs.
Executive Order No. 105 which mandates putting up of housing programs intended for poor older persons and PWDs was signed on May 16, 2002 by former President Gloria Arroyo.
“We saw the need of our fellow PWDs to have a house of their own. It’s a dream come true for us that we finally have a place of our own,” Fabiaña said.

The residents are thankful to have a house of their own while working at the same place. “We don’t have to go far just to report to work. We are saving our time and our money for daily commute.”

Livelihood opportunities within the village

Aside from helping provide housing to its members, the cooperative also offers livelihood opportunities.

The ADAP MPC Rotary Centro ng Pangkabuhayan operates a workshop inside the village where PWD members who are skilled in carpentry and welding can earn from making armchairs, desks and other furniture and fixtures.

“I’m used to this kind of work (carpentry). It’s not that difficult,” said Floro, from New Bataan in Compostela Valley province.

A person with post-polio syndrome since he was nine months old, it was only in 1991 that Floro was able to use a wheelchair. He used to earn a living by transporting coconut lumber. He did this by dragging the wood with the help of his carabao from interior areas to the poblacion.

Enrique Rollon, 44, has been working for the ADAP Multi-purpose cooperative for two years. A farmer in Maragusan also in Compostela Valley, the father of four lost his left leg in a vehicular accident in 1993. He now relies on his prosthetic leg so to move around without the aid of crutches while doing his work as welder and carpenter.

Floro and Rollon were once trained in carpentry and welding at the Our Lady of Victory Training Center when it was still operating in Sasa, Davao City. But when it was transferred to Babak, Island Garden City of Samal, which would require the two men to take a ferry boat ride and a habal-habal ride to reach, they decided to stay in Davao and find means to support their families.

Workers like Floro and Rollon earn at least P8,000 a month for making the armchairs and desks.

Enrique Rollon relies on his prosthetic leg to move around without the aid of crutches while doing his work as welder and carpenter in ADAP Village. Photo by JOHN FRANCES C. FUENTES

There are also residents who earn a living from other skills like repairing appliances.

A person with post-polio syndrome, Bernardo Dela Cruz, 47, makes ends meet for his wife and only son through his income earned from repairing appliances of his neighbors and other households.

His 47-year-old wife, Josephine, also a person with post-polio syndrome, runs a small sari-sari store.

To help people like the Dela Cruz couple improve their livelihood, ADAP MPC is planning to revive   a small loans scheme that members can tap for emergency or use as capital to start a small business.

Aside from money lending, the board members of ADAP MPC are looking into the possibility of putting up a bakery and a rice distribution store where they can sell bread and rice for members and non-members alike.

“We want to be productive and develop our entrepreneurial side. This will help us to change the notion that PWDs only earn a living through charity and dole-outs,” Fabiaña said.

She explained that there are also PWD residents who continue to work in the downtown area like in the Davao City Hall and in the government-owned Southern Philippines Medical Center.

“At first, we found it hard to commute from Indangan to the downtown area but we have learned to appreciate the distance. At least, when we go home, we can have our rest in this area far from the hustle and bustle of the city,” Fabiaña said.

The Dela Cruz couple, both with post-polio syndrome, lives in the village. Bernardo repairs appliances while Josephine runs a small sari-sari store. Photo by JOHN FRANCES C. FUENTES

The DepEd Central Office is ADAP MPC’s major partner, the official said, adding that the cooperative is a recipient of a grant to manufacture and supply their products to public schools. But she said they are also partnering with different private and public institutions to help ensure continuing job orders.

The cooperative, Fabiaña explained, is also using social media to promote their products and inform netizens about their village. There have been visitors from different PWD groups in the country who came to ADAP Village after seeing their online posts.

The ADAP Village is not the first in the country, but it is in Mindanao. A 2009 report by the Disability Rights Promotion International says three major housing projects for PWDs have been launched in 1983, 1987 and 1988, years before the enactment of RA 7277 and EO 105.

These are the Munting Pamayanan in Escopa, Project 4 built in 1983 through the partnership of the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), National Housing Authority (NHA) and Christoffel Blinden Mission (CBM), a nongovernment organization.

Four years later, the same organizations built the Karangalan Village Shelters in Pasig City. In 1988, the DSWD and NHA, this time with a different NGO, Epitaph Foundation, built the Padilla Housing Village in Antipolo City.

More than just working

While working in the workshop and in the downtown area is the routine on weekdays, some of the members of ADAP Village have formed a choral group and they sing every Sunday in the nearby Our Lady of Miraculous Medal Parish.

“When we were still starting as a group, some of us found it hard to attend the mass, feeling that we are ridiculed by the people because of our handicaps but I explained to my fellow members that people are just afraid to relate to them the same way that the PWDs are also afraid to befriend the other mass-goers who are not differently-abled,” Fabiaña said.

After reaching out to other mass-goers and bonding with other choir groups and servers in the parish, she said, the PWD choir members slowly gained confidence.

“PWDs like me should not lose hope. We must always do our best and continue praying. I understand that the challenge for PWDs to become productive is big but we should not give in to self-pity and shame. We are just like the others; normal beings who also have their own struggles,” she said.

Text and photos by KRIXIA SUBINGSUBING

VOICES echoed across the Senate conference room as senators and representatives of various persons with disabilities organizations across the nation discussed the creation of PWD Affairs Offices (PDAOs) at the local government level in 2008.

Charito “Chato” Manglapus, then president of Cerebral Palsied Association of the Philippines (CPAP), listened intently, but otherwise sat quietly in her wheelchair—until then National Council on Disability Affairs (NCDA) chair Rosie Romulo made the mistake of overgeneralizing: “…mentally challenged such as persons with cerebral palsy…”

In a high-pitched, almost child-like voice, Manglapus nervously but decisively challenged the assumption. “With all due respect, ma’am, hindi lahat ng may cerebral palsy ay mentally challenged (Not all persons with cerebral palsy are mentally challenged),” she said.

In what she fondly recalls as a defining moment in her lifelong advocacy for PWD rights, Manglapus would then become one of the most prominent voices in raising PWD awareness across the country as she became actively involved in policymaking and creation of civic programs for the sector.

Born in 1964 with severe spastic cerebral palsy, Manglapus, 61, was told by her adoptive parents that her biological mother tried to hide her pregnancy by using a girdle, which she claims may have caused the abnormal development of her spine.

Cerebral palsy is a group of movement disorders caused by an abnormal development in the part of the brain that affects mobility and coordination, as was Manglapus’ case.

“Noong bata ako, nakakalipat-lipat pa ako ng upuan mag-isa. Pero n’ung 10 years old na ako, (napansin) na nila mama, hirap na ‘ko tumayo (When I was younger, I used to be able to transfer chairs by myself. But when I reached 10 years old, my parents noticed it had become increasingly difficult for me),” she said.

Her adoptive mother, Aurora, laments that doctors had very little knowledge of cerebral palsy back then. In fact, she said, it took the late National Scientist Fe del Mundo to correctly diagnose Manglapus, then three years old, and refer them to what is now the Philippine Cerebral Palsy Inc. (PCPI).

Though she was never able to fully walk and has to move around in a wheelchair, Manglapus learned to do regular daily activities such as eating and writing—albeit at a sluggish pace—by herself, through the help of physical and occupational therapy.

“Ayoko rin nagbibigay ng burden sa mga taong nakapaligid sa’kin. Hangga’t kaya kong gawin mag-isa, gagawin ko (I don’t want to be a burden to everyone around me. As long as I can do it on my own, I will do it),” she said.

She finished elementary in Hacienda San Francisco Public High School, a regular school in Isabela. However, midway in her first year in high school, Manglapus, who was sickly and frail as a child, decided to undergo home tutoring rather than pursue secondary education.

Instead, she studied creative writing and oil painting, showing extraordinary skill in the latter.

As a child with cerebral palsy, she said she was fortunate enough to have been surrounded by friends and relatives who understood her condition, if not at least showed sympathy. But the shy, timid Manglapus would later on find real confidence in her life’s one true passion: advocacy work.

Manglapus is one of the first members of CPAP, a nonstock, nonprofit organization formed by persons with cerebral palsy who are actively engaged in civic work and policymaking regarding PWDs. It aims to promote awareness of as well as protect the rights of persons with cerebral palsy, and to encourage them to participate in nation-building despite their disability.

Encouraged by doctors from PCPI to form their own organization, CPAP was founded by fellow spastic cerebral palsy quadriplegic and close friend Rodrigo “Peewee” Kapunan in 1993, who also invited her on the organizational board.

Reluctantly assuming presidency in 2003, Manglapus sheepishly recalls avoiding board meetings during her first year as president, partly due to her embarrassment at her underdeveloped voice and her perceived lack of skill in handling the organization.

Eventually, fellow PWD Lauro Forcil gently chastised her, saying in order to lift society’s negative perception of their sector, she herself must work at the helm of all the organization’s efforts.

“Nahiya ako sa sarili ko n’un (I was ashamed of myself),” she smiled, shaking her head.

Since then, Manglapus assumed full command of the organization. Whatever she failed to learn in school, she learned during the course of her 10-year term: a firm grasp on laws and policies concerning the sector, and the ability to dialogue not only with authority but with her fellow PWDs.

Under her administration, CPAP, along with The Asia Foundation, launched its first project, the CPAP Awareness Project Seminar on Causes, Prevention, and Management series, which was held across the country, at the invitation of several local government units such as Cebu, Iloilo and Davao.

With the help of several resource speakers from the sector itself, they were able to visit schools and educate students and parents alike on the experiences and rights as a PWD. The awareness campaign specifically targeted to educate parents about cerebral palsy, so that they will not hide their children.

In line with this, Manglapus, alongside CPAP’s current president Dennis Ilagan, successfully lobbied in 2004 for the implementation of Presidential Proclamation 588, or the Cerebral Palsy Awareness and Protection (CPAP) Week, held annually during Sept. 16-22.

This, she said, is to encourage persons with cerebral palsy to participate in programs and activities specifically geared towards their skill and personality development.

It was under Manglapus’ leadership that CPAP, in partnership with The Asia Foundation, Australian Aid and the Commission on Elections, took a significant step in PWD suffrage through their Voters’ Education Campaign in 2012, which aimed to increase electoral participation among PWDs.

In accordance with Republic Act 7277 or the Magna Carta for PWDs, which recognizes the right of PWDs to suffrage, the organization conducted seminars in different towns where PWDs can validate or update their voter’s registrations in preparation for the 2013 elections.

A staunch advocate for PWD suffrage, Manglapus believes that elections must and should be an arena to voice out their sector’s concerns, concerns which are just as pressing, if not more than, as any as the rest of the nation’s.

“N’ung una akong bumoto, d’un ko talaga naramdaman na, ay, Filipino pala ako (When I first voted, that was when I realized I am a Filipino),” she said, laughing. “‘Yun ‘yung gusto kong maramdaman ng kapwa ko PWD, na karapatan nilang bumoto (That is what I want my fellow PWDs to feel, to recognize that it is their right to vote).”

While she has stepped down from presidency of CPAP, Manglapus acknowledges that there is still a lot to be done for her fellow PWDs, especially those with cerebral palsy.

For example, she said, CPAP, now under Ilagan’s leadership, is lobbying to include households with PWDs as automatic beneficiaries of the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino (4Ps) Program, as they are more likely to be pushed into poverty by higher out-of-pocket expenses for medicine, education and transportation.

Manglapus said she wishes that qualified PWDs with exceptional voice talents may be employed and trained in dubbing and broadcasting by radio and television networks—so that PWDs have a voice in media, literally.

While championing for an inclusive Philippines remains a difficult challenge, Manglapus hopes that one day, PWDs become empowered to assert their place in society—a place which is rightfully theirs in the first place.

“Dapat ang mga karapatan natin, binibigay sa’tin dahil sa atin ‘yun, hindi dahil kinakaawaan tayo (Our rights are not a privilege nor given out of sympathy, it is ours),” she said.

(The author is a journalism major of the University of the Philippines-Diliman. She submitted this story for the journalism seminar class “Reporting on Persons with Disabilities” under VERA Files trustee Yvonne T. Chua.)

Drop, cover, hold

Text and photos by YVONNE T. CHUA

AT 10:30 a.m., the hotel emergency alarm went off, signaling the start of Thursday’s “Shake Drill” designed to prepare Metro Manilans for a 7.2 magnitude earthquake or the “Big One.”

Many of the 30 or so guests meeting at the hotel’s fifth-floor function room quickly stood up and gathered their belongings. As some headed toward the door, an announcement in English blared over the PA system, reminding them to stay put and to drop, cover and hold.

Most did as told. But it took three guests slightly longer to do so: They were blind and had to be assisted to the floor.

Five others, all of them in wheelchairs, meanwhile, covered their heads with their hands.

In about a minute, the second announcement came: Evacuate the building.

The hotel staff requested everyone who had no disability to leave the room right away.

They would, they assured the group, take care of “extricating” persons with disabilities: the three blind guests, the five wheelchair users, an amputee who uses crutches—and one who passed himself off as a deaf person to test how well equipped the hotel was to evacuate persons with disabilities in case of a disaster.

And that was how Oakwood Premier Hotel in Ortigas, Pasig discovered it wasn’t, not even with the disaster training its staff had undergone just two weeks ago.

The reality check came from no less the leaders of disabled people’s organizations (DPOs) and disability advocates whom The Asia Foundation had gathered for a briefing on the Australian government’s disability strategy.

Had the TAF held the meeting in another hotel, the results would probably have been the same.

Ponce tests the hotel’s readiness to assist PWDs during disasters by pretending to be deaf.

As the guests exited Oakwood’s function room, deaf community advocate Arthur Allan Ponce dashed to the waitstaff and began signing as he pretended to be deaf. When he couldn’t get his message across, he used finger spelling. One of the waiters then led him to the fire escape—and left him there.

Unguided, Ponce made his way down to the ground floor where he approached the hotel’s “fire tenders,” again signing to them that he needed help. Apparently at a loss over how to deal with him, the tenders turned their backs on him.

Meanwhile, he could hear the announcements coming over the PA system or being shouted to guests. He observed the hotel had no lights to guide people with hearing disability had power been cut, and no sign cards with graphic warning to tell them and the other guests where to seek shelter.

“If this had happened at night, I would have been dead,” Ponce, of the Philippine Accessible Deaf Services, said after the half-hour drill.

ATRIEV’s Tony Llanes, who is blind, is assisted out of the function room

Back at Oakwood’s fifth floor, the hotel staff gingerly led the three blind persons one by one out of the function room, down through the fire escape to the ground floor. All of them are from the Adaptive Technology for Rehabilitation, Integration and Empowerment of the Visually Impaired (ATRIEV) who had gone to the meeting with just one companion.

But when they reached a supposedly safe place, “they just left me there,” said Atriev’s Carol Catacutan. “They didn’t endorse me to someone else.”

Evacuating the five wheelchair users from the fifth floor proved the most challenging for the hotel. The five waited patiently outside the function room as hotel personnel discussed among themselves how to carry them down five flights of stairs one at a time. The hotel has a spine board but didn’t use it in the drill.

Two hotel employees are assigned to bring CPAP’s Denny Ilagan to “safety”

Only two employees lifted the hefty Dennis Ilagan, president of the Cerebral Palsied Association of the Philippines, out of his wheelchair and carried him down the fire escape by the armpits and legs. The employees paused at every stair landing to catch their breath and switch positions as they felt the strain in their arms.

They eventually got Ilagan out to the street where a medic took his blood pressure. But hotel employees left his wheelchair on the fifth floor. This was brought down when the other wheelchair users firmly explained why Ilagan needed it.

“When the person gets to an accessible place, he’ll use the wheelchair to wheel himself to safety,” said AKAP-Pinoy’s Abner Manlapaz, who also uses a wheelchair.

“Rescuers” help Grace Ilagan, also of CPAP, back into her wheelchair

Two hotel employees would also later carry Ilagan’s wife, Grace, down and out of the building. But she was apprehensive throughout the rescue.

She could sense the employees’ panic and exhaustion. One of them had muttered, “Pagod na ako (I’m tired).”

Every time their grip on her slackened, Grace feared they would drop her and she might injure her spinal cord. “Please, not a spinal cord injury. I already have cerebral palsy,” she said.

Grace said she was lucky Shelly Thomson of Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade was nearby when she was being moved.

Thomson, who was in Manila to give briefings on Australia’s disability strategy and conduct disability training, showed hotel employees the correct way of carrying a PWD like Grace.

Unlike the Ilagans, Manlapaz refused to be bodily carried. He insisted on being brought down in his wheelchair.

His instruction was clear: Four people were needed to carry his wheelchair. The hotel assigned two. As they wended through the narrow fire escape, Manlapaz persuaded two more employees to help.

Out on the street, hotel guests found the first staging area was right under trees and an electricity post in front of the looming luxury hotel, instead of at the open-air parking lot adjoining it which was a safe zone.

In the end, the other two wheelchair users—Charito Manglapus of CPAP and Bianca Lapuz of the Commission on Elections—stayed behind on the fifth floor. Manglapus uses an electric wheelchair and Lapuz a wheelchair scooter.

Manglapus would say later that it would have been not only difficult but also dangerous to carry her down the way hotel staff did with the other wheelchair users because she can’t cross her arms.

Oakwood GM Trevor MacDonald records how the drill went

Later in the day, when things quieted down, Oakwood Premier general manager Trevor MacDonald personally thanked the PWDs and disability advocates for the valuable lessons the hotel unexpectedly learned first hand during the drill.

For Thursday’s drill, the hotel staff learned only at 10 a.m.—half an hour before the metrowide drill—that they would also be evacuating PWDs. This after the PWDs at the TAF meeting declared that they were joining the drill which, they said, should be disability inclusive.

Already considered by many disability advocates as PWD-friendly, the hotel was convening a special meeting that afternoon to discuss how it can better respond to disasters, especially for persons with disabilities, MacDonald said.

TAF Deputy Country Representative Maribel Buenaobra and other disability advocatessuggested disability sensitivity training not only for Oakwood but for other hotels, especially for first responders.

The government’s National Council for Disability Affairs runs such courses, including how to extricate people with different disabilities during emergencies.

The courses teach one- to four-person carry for persons with mobility problems, communicating through signing, writing or lip reading for those who are deaf or hard of hearing, and guiding blind people to safety, among other things, said NCDA’s Delfina Baquir.

Disability advocates also stressed the importance of providing instructions in Filipino or the vernacular, and in graphics.

But there’s an equally important thing to bear in mind when rescuing PWDs during disasters. Said Manlapaz: “Ask PWDs how they want to be assisted.”

During his free time, Torralba covers events related to PWDs. Photo courtesy of RAPHAEL TORRALBA

By CAMILLE AGUINALDO

RAPHAEL Torralba never thought that a fall from the stairs would change his life forever.

The impact of the accident when he was two years old left him with tinnitus, a ringing in the ears. He tried to subdue this unnerving feeling by covering his ears but to no avail. Every time his mother would call him, he did not respond. According to the doctor, the accident partially damaged his hearing.

Since then, the ringing in his ears has never left Torralba.

While growing up, the ringing was a constant reminder of a disability he did not fully understand. He was torn between whether he was deaf, though he does not sign, or hearing, though not fully hearing. And for that, he grew quiet and shy as he pondered over the lack of identity he felt.

“I didn’t have my own identity before. It was like I was lost in the world. Who am I really? Am I really Deaf or hearing? Because of that, I adjusted in the hearing world even though many discriminate,” the 31-year-old Torralba said in Filipino.

Little did the young Torralba know that someday he would lead in creating an organization representing the hard of hearing in the Philippines, which will help people who are hard of hearing like him identify themselves and embrace their disability.

In 2011, the International Federation of the Hard of Hearing People (IFHOH) approached Torralba with the intention to form a hard of hearing organization in the Philippines. The federation also wanted to establish a regional platform for the hard of hearing in Asia and the Pacific. Torralba agreed, saying he would try to gather persons who are hard of hearing.

“Walang boses at walang identidad ang hard of hearing sa Pilipinas unlike sa ibang bansa. Sa Europe, sa America, may deaf community, may hard of hearing community (People who are hard of hearing group have no voice and no identity in the Philippines, unlike other countries. In Europe and America, there is a deaf community and a hard of hearing community),” he said.

The term “hard of hearing” is used to define all groups of people with some level of hearing difficulty, including those with mild to profound hearing losses, according to IFHOH.

Most people who are hard of hearing are unaware of the nature of their disability. In Torralba’s case, it was only when he volunteered at the Philippine Federation of the Deaf (PFD) did he fully understand his disability, and its distinction from being deaf.

As things stand, people who are hard of hearing are clustered inside the Deaf community, even though there is a major difference between the two. For example, people who are hard of hearing use lip reading as a mode of communication while the Deaf use sign language.

The dilemma is that they do not hear but they are not deaf, Torralba said. Because of this, most people who are hard of hearing choose the hearing world and adjust. However, some go into the Deaf community.

But now that the hard of hearing are growing in numbers, they are planning to form an association, even a federation of the hard of hearing in the Philippines, Torralba said.

“The Arts in Silence Abilympian Triad” photo and painting exhibit of Torralba and Deaf artists Dennis Balan and Jose Dela Cruz in 2013. Photo courtesy of RAPHAEL TORRALBA

Torralba, who is a foreign service posts coordinator at the Department of Foreign Affairs, is organizing a regional workshop scheduled next year on the formation of a hard of hearing organization.

When IFHOH first contacted him four years ago, Torralba was then working as a writer and photojournalist at Withnews, a nongovernment organization and online news site on Persons with Disabilities based in South Korea.

Writing for Withnews exposed him to the different issues of persons with disabilities in the Philippines. His pieces were mostly on life stories of famous and successful PWDs, like Lauro Purcil, lead convenor in the Philippine Coalition on the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (PCUNCRPD).

When the photojournalist in Withnews resigned, Torralba was assigned as replacement. At the time, he had no experience in photography. But he accepted the job, treating it as a challenge to strive harder.

“Kuha lang ako ng kuha. Ganun pa rin. Malabo pa rin yung iba kong pictures. Napagsabihan pa ako ng boss ko. Wala akong alam nun. So yung ginawa ko, nag-self study na lang ako, mga books tapos mga Internet guides sa mga photographers (I just took shot after shot. It stayed the same. Some of my pictures were blurred. My boss even reprimanded. I knew nothing about photography back then. What I did, I self-studied with the use of books and Internet guides on photography),” he said.

It was during his coverage in 2008 of the “Photography with a Difference” project of John Chua, an advertising and commercial photographer,with Canon Philippines that Torralba discovered the power of photography. He found that photography can touch the lives of PWDs, and this was when his advocacy started, which is to raise awareness on the potential of PWDs in the Philippines.

“Take my case. I want accessible communication, so I express it through photography. I would take a picture of a parent and a Deaf child bonding using sign language. I am expressing through picture our communication needs,” he said in Filipino.

Torralba’s big break in the field of photography happened also in 2011 when he competed at the 8^th International Abilympics in Seoul. The International Abilympics competitions, “Olympics of Abilities,” are skills competitions for people with disabilities and special needs.

Torralba represented the Philippines in the photography category. He was among the top 10 out of 27 represented countries who excelled in photography.

After his triumph, Torralba, together with Deaf photographer Dennis Balan who was a photography Abilympian in 2003 and Jose Dela Cruz who was a painting contestant at both 2003 and 2011 International Abilympics, held photo and painting exhibits in malls, showcasing the talents of PWD artists and proving that their abilities are worthy of employment. Employers who saw the exhibits sent their calling cards to Torralba, offering PWDs jobs.

The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities mandates states to ensure the right of PWDs to the opportunity to gain a living in a work environment that is open, inclusive and accessible to them.

Unfortunately in the Philippines, many PWDs don’t stand a chance of getting work because of their disability. This even as the Magna Carta for Disabled Persons guarantees that “no disabled persons shall be denied access to opportunities for suitable employment.”

Torralba knows what it is like to be a victim of discrimination in school and in the job market.

His classmates and even his teachers bullied him when he was in school. He recalls his elementary teacher shouting at him and throwing his book away while the class was reading a story silently. Most of his classmates were laughing at him while some took pity. When Torralba’s mother learned about the incident, she reported it to the principal. The teacher was dismissed, but the bullying did not stop.

In college, a professor who knew his condition marked him absent after he failed to respond to his roll calls for attendance.

Torralba recalls the struggles he went through being a person who is hard of hearing. Photo by CAMILLE AGUINALDO

Having difficulties communicating with people, Torralba practiced lip reading in his youth. And if he still had troubles understanding what the person was saying, he would ask the person to write what he or she wanted to say on a piece of paper.

After graduating from college, Torralba spent two years applying for a job but was repeatedly rejected because of his disability. For example, he applied at a multinational company and passed the exam and interview. But when he underwent medical examination, the doctor turned him down because he is hard of hearing.

“Ang tinitignan nila, yung disability ko, hindi yung ability ko (What these companies see is my disability, not my disability),” he said.

Fortunately, he stumbled upon the job opening at Withnews. He applied and got his first job. The rest is history.

Today, Torralba has a stable job and has won international awards for photography. He is channeling his efforts toward create a hard of hearing organization in the Philippines which he hopes will be his legacy. But his advocacy of helping PWDs through his pen and his camera continues to consume him.

“Para sa akin, pinakamalaki kong achievement ay naiinspire ko yung mga persons with disabilities. Wala nang replacement(For me, my greatest achievement is when I inspire persons with disabilities. There is no replacement),” he said.

(The author recently graduated with a journalism degree from the University of the Philippines-Diliman. She submitted this story for the journalism seminar class “Reporting on Persons with Disabilities” under VERA Files trustee Yvonne T. Chua.)

For Cuya mobility impairment is no barrier to driving. Photo by VJ BACUNGAN

By VJ Bacungan

DRIVING a manual can be agonizing for many drivers, especially in the stop-start traffic of the often-gridlocked metro. Anyone who has been on EDSA or C-5 during rush hour knows the strain of constantly pushing and balancing the clutch pedal just to move at a snail’s pace, like a sadistic dance between car and driver that seems to go on and on.

But 58-year-old family driver Roberto Cuya has no trouble handling the footwork, even though his left foot was crushed by a bus as a teenager. That same foot would be fractured nearly 30 years later, permanently damaging it and, thus, requiring him to use crutches to walk.

“A lot of people are surprised when they see me get out of the driver’s seat,” he said.

Although many would think that Cuya only drives an automatic, he more often drives a manual. In fact, he said he can still do the over-nine-hour drive from his home in Quezon City to his province in Bicol with no problems.

Affectionately called “Uncle Boy” by his family, Cuya has been behind the wheel since he got his professional driver’s license in 1980. Interestingly, he said the Land Transportation Office has never raised an issue over his disability every time he renews his license, which likewise doesn’t carry a condition.

The LTO gives the following license conditions for drivers with impairment: A requires wearing eyeglasses, B requires special equipment for the upper limbs, C requires special equipment for the lower limbs, D restricts the driver to daylight driving and E requires the accompaniment of a person with “normal” hearing.

But driving is more than just a job for Uncle Boy. “I am happiest when I’m behind the wheel,” he said. “I don’t know why, but I feel shy when I’m around other people. But when I drive, I don’t feel like I have a disability. I feel like a normal person.”

Born in Project 4, Quezon City, Uncle Boy is the second of 10 children of Jovito, a sari-sari store owner and jeepney operator, and Nonita, a tailor. Shortly after his birth, his family moved back to their province, the municipality of Tiwi in Albay. There, his love affair with cars began.

Uncle Boy recalls his grandfather—a wealthy businessman who operated a bus company, owned a store and managed a rice field—and his collection of American cars: a Chevrolet, a Ford and an International Harvester. “In a small town like ours, a car was really a status symbol,” he said.

Ironically, it was these very objects of affection and status that led to his first encounter with a disability. Fresh out of high school in 1976, Uncle Boy was out with his driver in their 30-passenger Chevrolet Series 30 bus when the tire blew out.

“While I was helping change the tire, the jack slipped and the entire wood body fell on my left foot,” he said. He was able to walk again a year later.

Cuya in his favorite spot Behind the wheel. Photo by VJ BACUNGAN

Uncle Boy’s love for cars and driving also spilled over to his education and career. After studying to become a seaman at the Philippine Maritime Institute, he studied to become an auto mechanic. After this, he worked as a driver for a bus company in the province and even became a jeepney driver in Manila in the 1980s.

But nearly three decades after being crushed by a bus, Uncle Boy’s left foot was once again injured in 2004 after he accidentally slipped. This time, the damage from the resulting fracture was far more severe. A metal implant had to be surgically placed into his foot at a hospital in Urdaneta, Pangasinan.

However, his foot got infected and he was brought to the University of Santo Tomas Hospital in Manila, where doctors removed the implant and put an antibiotic bridge into the bone. “After a week, the bridge was removed, but I haven’t walked properly since then,” he said.

The injury and the operations eventually disfigured his left foot, making it around four inches shorter than his right foot. Although he doesn’t have much feeling in his foot anymore, Uncle Boy said he needs to use crutches when walking because he is afraid that stepping on it with his body’s weight could cause it to break again.

However, he can still exert enough force to depress the clutch. “I never lost hope in life since I could still drive,” he said. But the damage to his foot meant that therapy was not a viable option anymore. His disability is likewise complicated by diabetes and uric acid problems.

Despite all these, Uncle Boy said he has never been discriminated or made fun of outright. “Although I can’t be sure of what people say behind my back,” he said. He is also given priority in various establishments.

In line with the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which the Philippines is a signatory of, Republic Act 7277 or the Magna Carta for Disabled Persons upholds the fundamental rights of persons with disabilities, including protection against discrimination and the establishment of priority lanes.

Uncle Boy’s disability also didn’t stop him from working with cars. In 2007, he was hired as the branch manager of his brother-in-law’s Rapide franchise in Tarlac. He was even given an award for his exemplary performance.

He left his job in 2010. Shortly after, his younger brother, Jovito Jr., a doctor in Quezon City, hired him as his family’s live-in driver.

“Uncle Boy doesn’t like hanging around, doing nothing. That’s why my dad took him in to drive for us. He even taught me how to drive,” said 20-year-old Karl Cuya, Uncle Boy’s nephew and a fourth-year medical technology student at Our Lady of Fatima University.

Karl said his family has always been very supportive of Uncle Boy, especially since both his parents are doctors who can provide free medical care for him. “My dad has also been encouraging him to get a PWD ID,” he said.

According to a 2008 Administrative Order of the National Council for Disability Affairs, the government agency in charge of implementing PWD policies, a PWD ID may be obtained at the Office of the Mayor, the Office of the Barangay Captain, the NCDA or its regional counterpart, Department of Social Welfare and Development offices and participating organizations with memoranda of agreement with the Department of Health. Applicants must submit a fully accomplished application form, two 1’x1’ ID pictures and aduly signed clinical abstract by any licensed private, government clinic, or hospital-based physician.

R.A. 9422, which amends R.A. 7277, stipulates the benefits of the ID, including at least 20 percent discount for medicines, medical and dental services, transportation and even in hotels, restaurants and movie houses, among others.

But as much as Uncle Boy appreciates the perks, he said he doesn’t have an ID yet because the process of getting one is too difficult. “The PWD office in my barangay is hard to get to since I have to climb stairs,” he said.

He would really prefer a method of applying for an ID without showing up at the office. In fact, he believes that it would be a better idea to give benefits to PWDs even without showing an ID.

Karl agrees, saying that a less taxing application process, such as through postal mail or online, would be far easier for PWDs.

R.A. 10070, the law that established the NCDA, mandates local government units to put up a Persons with Disability Affairs Office or appoint a PWD Affairs Officer to cater to the needs of PWDs. Additionally, the Marcos-era Batas Pambansa 344 enumerates guidelines that establishments, including government offices, must follow to ensure accessibility for PWDs, such as providing ramps, railings and elevators to aid mobility.

Uncle Boy also criticized how PWDs in the country are not given enough job opportunities, with many wanting to return to the workforce to contribute to society. “I prefer working over begging,” he said.

R.A. 10524, which also amends R.A. 7277, requires at least 1 percent of employees in government offices to be PWDs, with the same percentage being encouraged for private companies that have over 100 employees. This law also gives incentives to private employers that hire PWDs, including a 25 percent tax deduction to their gross income, based on wages to PWD employees, and a 50 percent tax deduction to their net income, based on the cost of PWD-friendly features that are outside those required under B.P. 344.

Between driving duties, Uncle Boy enjoys working on cars. His face lit up when he talked about his pride and joy, a 1987 Nissan Maxima.

“I bought it in Filinvest a few years ago for P40,000. I like its performance since it has a 2.0-liter engine. And it really feels like a luxury car. I’m hoping to restore it to showroom condition one day,” he said.

Uncle Boy’s wife, Saturnina, passed away in 1987. He has two children who support him emotionally and financially. Son Anthony is a physical therapist and daughter Jessica is a nurse in Manila who is qualifying to work in Canada and is planning to bring Uncle Boy with her.

But Uncle Boy has made it very clear to his daughter that he will only live with her abroad when he gets tired of working. “But as long as I have the strength, I’ll keep on driving,” he said.

(The author recently graduated with a journalism degree from the University of the Philippines-Diliman. He submitted this story for the journalism seminar class “Reporting on Persons with Disabilities” under VERA Files trustee Yvonne T. Chua.)

Text and video by GRAZIELLE CHUA

THE multi-awarded athlete holds his right fist to his chest as he recalls the moment the Philippine flag was being raised after he won at the 9th Far East and South Pacific (FESPIC) Games in Kuala Lumpur in 2006. Besting more than 40 countries in the pentathlon wheelchair event by a mere two points, he calls his victory a “miracle.”

Juanito “Speedy” Mingarine brought home the gold medal with a total of 4,447 points from the shotput, javelin, 200-meter, discus throw and 1,500-meter events. He considers this as one of the most memorable wins he has had in all his 25 years of being an athlete.

“I was so happy, I was so proud,” he said. “When they were playing Lupang Hinirang, I was crying and shaking all over.”

Mingarine is one of the athletes with disabilities (AWD) who have brought home multiple awards for the Philippines from international sporting competitions. Since he started competing in 1990, he has brought pride and honor to the country in wheelchair racing, wheelchair basketball and athletics. He also competed in power lifting, canoe kayak and wheelchair ballroom dancing, and plays wheelchair tennis and swimming as a hobby.

What he calls his “only treasures in life” are the awards he gained from these competitions. Among the long list of awards under his belt are a first place win in the male category of wheelchair ballroom dancing in 2008, a Mythical Five Award for wheelchair basketball from the Philippine Sports Association for the Differently Abled (PhilSPADA) Para National Games in 2012, and a bronze medal for wheelchair basketball from the 7th ASEAN Para Games held in Vietnam last year.

This year, as captain ball of the Philippine national team for wheelchair basketball Pilipinas Warriors, he is hoping to bring home another medal for the country in the 8th ASEAN Para Games scheduled in December in Singapore.

Being an AWD has not been an easy ride to success, though, for this 43-year-old athlete.

Mingarine was born third in a family of eight children in Villasis, Pangasinan to Roberto and Antonia Mingarine on March 5, 1972. He got the polio virus when he was 8 months old.

The highly infectious disease is caused by a virus that invades the nervous system and can leave a person totally paralyzed. One in 200 infections is said to lead to irreversible paralysis, while 5 to 10 percent of those paralyzed lead to death when the breathing muscles become immobilized.

Children under 5 years old are most vulnerable to the disease. No cure has been found for polio, but it can be prevented with multiple vaccination.

For Mingarine, the virus led to bone deformations in both of his legs, causing them to shrink and lose strength, affecting his ability to walk. He recalls having to crawl around their house up until he was 6 years old. He was eventually able to walk with the use of crutches when he underwent surgery to straighten his legs at the Philippine Orthopedic Center in 1978.

That same year, his parents sent him to Cainta, Rizal to study at the Marick Elementary School through a scholarship offered by Tahanang Walang Hagdanan, a nonprofit nongovernment organization that offers rehabilitation and skills training for people with orthopedic disability.

During special occasions like its anniversary, Tahanan would organize sporting events for their residents and employees. That was how Mingarine was exposed to sports. Through wheelchair racing, he realized his potential and dreamed of playing professionally in the future.

“I would always win back then. So I said to myself that maybe I can go to other countries with sports. I know no one could beat me,” he said.

Although he was away from his family, he reveled in his new home and his newfound passion for sports.

He had to leave Tahanan, however, to return to Pangasinan to continue his studies at the Amang Perez National High School. The school was a kilometer away and every day, he had to be driven in a bicycle with a sidecar.

Unlike Tahanan, his hometown made him feel different from the people around him that he eventually took his disability with a heavy heart. Looking back, he regrets not being able to go out with friends whenever he wanted, dance at school events, and court his crushes because of his disability.

Athlete Juanito Mingarine shows off his basketball skills on the court in Tahanang Walang Hagdanan. Photo by GRAZIELLE CHUA

“It came to a point where I would blame my family and God. I even thought about taking my own life. But I couldn’t do it,” he said.

He decided to direct his attention to sports, at the expense of his studies. He would always play basketball, wheeling himself in his sidecar and shooting hoops with friends.

He later struck a deal with his parents, promising to do well in his studies in exchange for a wheelchair. His parents came through with their end of the deal, but Mingarine still found himself focused on basketball such that after his graduation, he went back to Tahanan to pursue sports instead.

“I was not that good in basketball yet, however. The veterans in Tahanan challenged me and made me better,” he said. Mingarine eventually honed his skills and competed in various sporting competitions representing the organization and the country.

Since becoming a part of the national team for wheelchair basketball in 1998, he was given a free dormitory at the PhilSports Arena in Pasig City.

His exposure and participation to sports was not the only thing he had Tahanan to thank for. Mingarine also found a job at the organization. He was assigned to quality assurance and research development of wheelchairs. But more important, the organization also helped him see his disability in a positive light.

“Tahanan has been a great help to me. It was through Tahanan that I accepted who I am. It was as if all the pain and wounds from the past healed,” he said.

The first few years of his sporting career, however, was met with a lot of trials: New equipment, proper coaching and training facilities, as well as lack of support from the government were lacking.

“I trained by myself. I did not depend on the training provided. I persevered to gain strength and trained every day,” he said.

Through sports, Mingarine also learned valuable life lessons. A loss in wheelchair racing in the first Philippine Wheelathon held in 1997 caused him to lose interest in racing. He had trained hard for the event and even bought a new front wheel from abroad for his racing wheelchair, all to no avail. It was because he failed to check the side wheels, which had loose screws. His complacency led to the side wheel falling off during the race, leaving him with an 11th place finish.

“That became a lesson for me. Before, I only relied on my strength and I didn’t care for equipment. I just competed right then and there,” Mingarine said.

In 2002 marital problems led to a split-up with his wife, who took their three children with her. He turned to alcohol to forget his problems. “Every night, I would drink. It was like the whole purpose of my life disappeared,” he said.

Mingarine’s vices caught up with him and took a toll on his health. He developed hypertension, which made it hard for him to play again. He took his condition as a sign to train again and to focus on sports instead. With continuous training, he went back to his old self and eventually climbed to the peak of his athletic career.

His win in the 9th FESPIC Games in 2006 was the start of his international recognition. He was also recognized that year in the San Miguel Corp.-Philippine Sportswriters Association (SMC-PSA) Annual Awards, which featured the best in Philippine sports.

Mingarine felt like a “superstar” as he was honored alongside athletes such as boxing champion Manny Pacquiao, billiards legend Efren “Bata” Reyes, World Pool Champion Ronnie Alcano, basketball star James Yap, and many other athletes who made news in 2006.

“I was so happy and my whole family was there. They didn’t expect that even if I have a disability, I could give pride, not only to my family but to the whole country,” he said.

He dreams of one day being able to coach basketball to give back and share his knowledge and skills to the next generation of athletes.

However, Mingarine resents the fact that despite being a part of the national team, AWDs are still not being supported by the government. He said bigger incentives are given to athletes without disabilities who win in international sporting competitions.

International and local policies uphold the rights of PWDs in sports, as well as other aspects in life. These include equal participation in sport and the availability of state-provided training in sports and physical fitness, as stated in the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the Magna Carta for Persons with Disabilities.

Despite these policies, however, AWDs continue to experience discrimination because of the lack of laws protecting their welfare as athletes.

In 2001, Republic Act 9064, or the National Athletes, Coaches and Trainers Benefits and Incentives Act, set aside cash awards for national athletes who will bring home medals from international competitions. The law does not include AWDs in the definition of “national athletes,” making them unable to receive equal cash incentives if they won in international competitions.

Had AWDs been included in the law, Mingarine would have been entitled to P1 million for his first place win in the 2006 FESPIC Games, which is now known as the Asian Games. However, he only received P100,000, a mere 10 percent of the cash award for athletes without disabilities who brought home a gold medal from the international competition.

“We hope one day it (the cash incentive) becomes equal because we represent the same country,” Mingarine said.

Aside from advocating for AWDs, Mingarine is starting up the Philippine Central Axis for Persons with Disabilities, which aims to provide a home and offer jobs to PWDs. He is also co-founder of a start-up company called JAJEV Industry, which manufactures converts vehicles to help PWDs drive a car or tricycle without the use of legs.

His experiences in sports and his life have made Mingarine the person that he is today —humble and thankful for all the blessings that he continues to receive. Life may have been a bumpy ride, but, he said, it is the journey that makes it worth living.

(The author is a journalism major of the University of the Philippines-Diliman. She submitted this story for the journalism seminar class “Reporting on Persons with Disabilities” under VERA Files trustee Yvonne T. Chua.)

By DANIEL ABUNALES

RAY Charles, Stevie Wonder, Andrea Bocelli: world-renowned artists with visual impairments yet with exceptional musical talents. They’ve had countless performances before admiring fans.

Unfortunately in the Philippines, visually impaired talents are often relegated to street sidewalks or found performing under a bridge, a donation box close by. Stationed in crowded areas, they are largely ignored by passersby.

But Tuesday last week, musical talents with visual impairments took center stage, literally, at the first Himig Tanglaw at the Sky Dome of SM North Edsa.

Coming from around Luzon – Pangasinan, Nueva Ecija, Bulacan, Cavite and Metro Manila, they performed to a crowd of not less than a thousand.

Himig Tanglaw is the culminating activity of the observance of the White Cane Safety Day, created under Republic Act 6759 or the White Cane Act.

The law is meant “to instill public awareness of the plight of blind people”, and to promote their well-being.

Eleven performers for the solo category, and four groups for the battle of the band competed for the first Himig Tanglaw title.

Himig Tanglaw lead organizer and president of the Philippine Chamber of Massage Industry of Visually Impaired Inc. (PCMIVI) Ronnel Del Rio said the response from the blind community was overwhelming.

“Kasi matagal na nilang gusto na may bagong platform. Nawawala kasi ang bulag sa music industry. Although may mga natitira pang iilan but we want to restore them to the music industry (They’ve been wanting to perform. There are no more blind musicians. There are some left and we want to get them back.),” added Del Rio.

Since Willy Garte, no one from the blind community has penetrated the mainstream music industry again. The singer-composer died in an accident more than a decade ago.

Bernadette Navarro, vocalist of the Call Foundation of the Blind band, said that events like Himig Tanglaw could boost the morale of visually impaired people who are musically gifted.

“Na-inspire nga ako nito kasi kaya naman talaga ng visually impaired na makipagsabayan (I’m inspired because musicians who are visually impaired are really capable of doing this),” she said.

Prodex Tipano, leader and drummer of the Sharp Troopers band, said that providing a venue for people with visual impairment to showcase their musical prowess breaks the stereotype.

“Binigyan kami ng pagkakataon na maipakita o maipamalas yung talent namin bukod sa massage (We are given a chance to showcase our talents apart from doing massage).”

Tipano’s bandmate, Charina Limpiado, however, said that not seeing the crowd’s reaction is one of the greatest challenges of a blind performer.

“Hindi kami nakakakita. Hindi namin alam kung nasisiyahan po ba sila or hindi po (We cannot see them so we don’t know if they like our performance or not),” said Limpiado.

To deal with this challenge, she gives her best in every performance.

Charmaine Tonic, who has been singing since she was seven, and joining competition since she was 14, said music made her comfortable about herself.

Now 21, Tonic said that the crowd’s reaction amazed her. “Nagulat ako na na-appreciate nila first note pa lang hanggang matapos ko yung kanta (I was surprised that they liked my performance),” she added.

Del Rio said he’s planning to do the activity in several provinces next year.

Winners of the Himig Tanglaw will be part of a road show that will include an open forum that aims to educate the public on visual impairment.

Text and photos by JHESSET THRINA O. ENANO

WHEN Ronald Manguiat was still studying at the Philippine Normal University (PNU) in Manila, the National Library of the Philippines (NLP) on T.M. Kalaw Avenue a few blocks away was his go-to place. He visited the library almost daily in his four years in college, relying heavily on its resources to help him in his studies in Secondary Education.

Manguiat was drawn to one particular section: an air-conditioned, 400-square-meter area on the ground floor of the West Wing. It’s the Library for the Blind Section (LBS), which has a Perkins brailler, or Braille typewriter with nine keys.

The services at LBS were important to Manguiat, a student with visual disability. PNU’s own library is still unequipped with resources for students who are blind or with low vision.

As he studied to be a teacher, Manguiat realized one glaring setback in the country’s official national library. The two-decade-old Library for the Blind lacks Filipiniana materials in accessible formats, such as in Braille and in large print, for people like him. This despite the mandate of the National Library as the “repository of the printed and recorded cultural heritage of the country” and its objective to “acquire and preserve Filipiniana materials.”

The deficiency applies not only to resources written in Filipino, but also to those about the Philippines itself. It reflects the state of development of accessible materials for people with visual impairment who, according to the 2000 census, comprise the biggest number of Filipinos with disabilities.

Dearth of accessible collection long a problem

The 128-year-old National Library has more than a million materials in its collection, most of them in Filipiniana. The Library for the Blind Section, previously the Division for the Blind, opened in 1995.

The section houses materials in Braille, large print and audio recording. It offers for free services such as borrowing of books, recording of printed materials to compact discs (CDs) or cassette tapes, and embossing or Braille printing.

Three years before the Library for the Blind Section opened, Republic Act No. 7277, the Magna Carta for Persons with Disabilities, was passed, providing for the establishment of Braille and Record libraries in provinces, cities or municipalities under the Department of Education (DepEd), then referred to as the Department of Education, Culture and Sports.

Despite R.A. 7277 law, LBS remains the only one of its kind in the country, NLP Reference Division chief Dolores Carungui said. (The section was moved to Carungui’s division in 2004 moved under the government’s rationalization program.) And that makes the scarcity of Filipiniana materials in accessible formats all the more worrisome.

The issue has plagued LBS since its establishment and is documented in reports to the International Federation of Librarians Associations and Institutions (IFLA) and the Conference of Directors of National Libraries in Asia and Oceania (CDNLAO).

The reports fault the insufficient local production of Braille and large print materials in Filipino, as the Library of the Blind Section lives off foreign donations.

In the Philippines, only two institutions produce materials in accessible formats for people with visual disability. The nongovernmental Resources for the Blind Inc. (RBI) produces them upon request. The Philippine Printing House for the Blind (PPHB), an agency under the DepEd, produces textbooks for special education schools, catering to elementary and high school students.

Relying on donations

The collection of LBS consists of mostly donations from RBI and PPHB, with more coming from RBI. Some materials are also given by the Xavier Society for the Blind, an organization based in New York. Donations from both RBI and Xavier Society are from abroad, mostly from unwanted collections from the United States.

“It’s automatic; once they discard materials, it goes straight to us,” said Mayette Regala, who is in charge of information technology and accessible digital publishing at RBI.

Regala, who is also the contact person of LBS, said the sources of donations include the Library of Congress, National Library Services for the Blind, American Printing House and American Action Fund, which, she said, send “discarded textbooks, dictionaries, encyclopedias.”

As a result, the foreign materials that find their way to LBS have old publication dates, and even older and more obscure titles. While fiction books like the Harry Potter series—one of the most in-demand titles in the section—can be timeless, nonfiction ones, such as textbooks and other educational materials, can contain obsolete information.

The last time RBI donated to the library was in 2012. According to the library’s annual report, there was no collection development for LBS in 2013.

Allan Mesoga, a graduate of PNU who, like Manguiat, has visual disability, recalled having borrowed a book on algebra from the Library for the Blind Section dating many years back.

“I think the copyright was 1969,” said Mesoga who now works as a proofreader in PPHB. “I borrowed the entire set because I needed it then.”

Hindrances to reproduction in Braille

The National Library is notable for being the home of the original manuscripts of Jose Rizal’s Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo. As of this writing, LBS has Braille copies of both titles, as well as a copy of Pasyón.

These three titles, however, are the only Filipiniana materials LBS has and are dwarfed by hundreds more foreign titles. These copies were reproduced due to client requests. Afterwards, LBS decided to have copies of its own.

Carungui pointed to Republic Act No. 8293, the Intellectual Property Code of the Philippines, as one of the hindrances to the reproduction of Filipiniana materials in Braille and large print.

The 1997 law sets limitations on copyright, particularly on the reproduction and recording of copyrighted materials. Amendments passed in 2013, however, exempted from infringement the reproduction and distribution of materials for those with visual impairments, provided that these will be free of charge.

“Maybe we can now slowly address the issue on Filipiniana materials because now we can duplicate our (printed) Filipiniana collections,” Carungui said.

But Maria Lea Vilvar, the only blind librarian working in LBS and the entire library, said the law is not the only issue. A bigger, and more important, one is manpower.

“I want to produce. The problem is there is no one to encode,” said Vilvar, who has been with LBS since its inception. “They (NLP officials) assign different people to the section, but make them do different work.”

Four people are assigned to LBS: Vilvar, a sighted librarian, a support staff and Flordeliza Quinones, concurrent section chief and Reference Division deputy chief.

Braille production begins with the scanning of printed pages. The pages should be in full text format, to be edited and proofread. The pages are then converted to audio or Braille using a software such as the Duxbury Braille Translator, which translates pages in just one command.

LBS has two embossers or Braille printers called Romeo and Juliet. Romeo costs around P155,000 and prints 25 pages per minute on a single page. Juliet costs P200,000 and can print doubled sided, at 60 pages a minute.

Vilvar said Romeo was a donation, while Juliet was bought in 2012 by the NLP administration on her request.

While Vilvar can do the scanning, converting and embossing, her disability hinders her from editing and encoding the document herself, she said.

Donnalyn Hermosura, a sighted librarian who worked with Vilvar for 10 years in the section before she was moved to the Catalog Division, said editing is the critical stage of the production process.

“The edit should really be exact with the collection copy itself,” she said. “That really takes time.”

Dwindling collection, reader visits

The National Library is at present undergoing a massive retrofitting, which will run to 2018. The Reference Division closed in July 2014.

LBS was one of the earliest to close because of its location on the ground floor. Right now, only its embossing services are available. Most of its Braille collections are shelved in the main administrative area in the upper floors, while some are stocked elsewhere.

Quinones, section chief, said specific data on the number of collections are hard to obtain, especially since the construction began.

“We are doing an ongoing inventory,” she said. “While we don’t have readers yet, we organize first, do the inventory, go back to zero in the Online Public Access Catalog (OPAC).”

The collection has dwindled in the past years. The 1999 status report to IFLA showed the library had 922 Braille titles, 462 large print titles and 880 cassette titles. At present, LBS has 647 titles of Braille and large print combined, with 3,373 volumes of Braille materials and 1,099 in large print, Quinones said. She was not able to provide the data on audio recordings.

Quinones said the National Library has occasionally donated Braille books to other public libraries since 2011.

“When we weed out a material, following a specific criteria, we put it in the stock room,” she said. “If a library asks materials for their visually impaired clients, we give them as donation.”

The Quezon City Public Library main branch is one of the recipients. Located within the City Hall compound, the library has a small section for persons with disabilities (PWDs), consisting of a small shelf with materials for the disability sector such as handbooks and manuals.

The city library has two Braille books donated by LBS. One is titled Knitting without Tears. The other, The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, is the second of three volumes. The first and third volumes are nowhere to be seen.

“We can’t choose from donations they (LBS) give,” said Mary Ann Bernal, who is in charge of the section.

Meanwhile, reader visits to LBS have also gone down. There are days when it has no clients. In 2013, only 63 clients were served by LBS for different services.

“The collection needs to be updated. Sometimes, the client calls, but we don’t have the book or material they need,” Vilvar said. “They won’t go here. Why would they need to go here?”

While the collection is a letdown, the services offered by LBS are still necessary. Manguiat and Mesoga said they both used the services to get Braille copies and audio recordings of their class notes and research. When it was still open to the public, its audio recording service was in great demand because it is less meticulous than embossing.

Toward a PWD-friendly National Library

The scarcity of accessible materials is not lost on library users with visual impairment. It means they need to access other sections, such as the Filipiniana, for the materials that are not in LBS, then bring them to the section to have them converted to audio or Braille.

In Mesoga’s case, he had to buy the required college books in print, and have them converted or embossed either at LBS or RBI.

Carungui said the National Library is targeting the reopening of the Reference Division next year. She said plans are afoot to make LBS PWD-friendly.

“We want to serve not just those with visual impairment, but other disabilities as much as we can,” she said. “We need to improve not only the collection, but (we need) the staff to be capacitated on how to handle PWDs. The facilities should also be adjusted,” Carungui said.

Manguiat said greater government support is needed to develop LBS. “We need more materials, latest gadgets for the needs of blind people, new books, and a much bigger area,” he said.

Now a teacher at the Philippine National School for the Blind, Manguiat said he recommends LBS to his students despite its shortcomings. “The library is still a good help to them,” he said.

(The author graduated last June with a journalism degree from the University of the Philippines-Diliman. She submitted this story for the journalism seminar class “Reporting on Persons with Disabilities” under VERA Files trustee Yvonne T. Chua.)

Text, photos and video by JHESSET THRINA ENANO

IN contrast to the busy urban scene outside, the halls of St. Paul University in Manila are quiet on a Saturday afternoon. At its College of Music and the Performing Arts, however, voices resonate through the corridors, singing to the accompaniment of a piano.

The maestro on the piano is Anderson Go. As his fingers skim deftly over the ebony and ivory keys, he listens intently to the trio of male voices that fill the room. During Saturday rehearsals with his chorale, Go makes sure every note is hit perfectly. Otherwise, his fingers stop playing.

“Can we repeat that?” he says as he corrects the singers: a flat note here, a high pitch there.

To people listening from outside, the chorale seems only common in the college. But a closer look shows that the performers are extraordinary: All of them are visually impaired and have been brought together by a passion for music.

Go leads this team. Now 46, he was born with congenital glaucoma, a progressive ailment that increases pressure in the eyes because of fluid build-up. Despite several eye operations, he completely lost his sight at 14 years old.

Two years after, he began his formal training in music. Little did he know that nearly two decades later, he would not only be playing for himself, but for a bigger purpose.

In September 2000, Go formed the Ambassadors of Light, a group of musically talented children and young adults, aimed to provide formal musical training, educational scholarship and assistance to its visually impaired beneficiaries. The initiative opened a new path to young visually impaired but musically talented Filipinos like him.

Go himself had struggled to pursue his own passion for music after he could no longer see. The adjustment for the young Anderson, who used to be active in sports, did not come easy. Unlike the basketball and the bicycle, letting go of the piano keys was out of question.

“Before, I can still see the keyboard, the keys of the piano,” he said. “When I became totally blind, I really needed to know the touch and feel of the keys, the distance of one note to the

In his musically inclined family, Go and his three siblings had taken formal piano lessons when they were young. In the end, however, he was the only one who pursued music as a career. Pushing the boundaries further, he began formal classical voice training at 17 years old.

Three decades of studying music has made Go’s ears attuned to even the slightest mistakes in singing or playing, and even the most minimal of noises. During rehearsal, he politely requests parents to avoid going out the door, as he hears it swing open and close.

Like many young visually impaired Filipinos, Go attended the Philippine National School for the Blind (PNSB) in his early schooling years, where he further studied Braille. Without an exclusive college yet for blind students in the country, he decided to enroll in the Philippine Women’s University (PWU), studying double degrees in classical piano and classical voice.

It took him nine years to finish both programs, becoming the first visually impaired graduate of the university.

“Joining a regular class for us is not easy,” he said, noting that all blind students from PNSB enroll in regular universities after. “You have to adjust, cope with the lessons as fast as you can. That was the most challenging, yet interesting part of the experience.”

Upon graduation, Go taught voice classes in PWU for six years and also worked in St. Paul University. Recently, he was given the opportunity to teach at the College of Music of the University of the Philippines Diliman.

He originally wanted to be a performer, but life took him in a different direction: He became an educator.

“I enjoy teaching when I see my students are learning and improving, and that is now my greatest achievement,” he said. “If they have other skills that I do not, it’s good for me. They can go farther than what I have achieved.”

As the founder and musical director of the Ambassadors of Light (AOL), Go gathers scholarship funds through the help of donors and supporters. The beneficiaries should be enrolled in a music degree in college.

Financial assistance also comes from those who witness the students’ singing and dancing talents during the group’s performances. Their members have performed major concerts locally, even represented the Philippines in music festivals abroad such as in Taiwan and Japan.

For Go, the decision to call the group “ambassadors of light” is based on his own experience of finding guidance through God’s “heavenly light” whom he calls his personal ambassador.

He said he hopes the group would bring light to others who also have visual impairment, especially those who think losing their sight means the end of their world.

“I want to show them that no, this is just the start of a new path in your life,” he said. “As you go through (your) journey, this group will be your light.”

This Saturday, only three of eight members show up for rehearsal owing to schedule conflicts. Julius Contrata, 32, was one of the first scholars of AOL; he took a special course in voice in PWU from 2000 to 2005. He now works as a licensed masseur therapist at the Visually Impaired Brothers for Excellent Services, but still performs with AOL.

Contrata describes Go as a strict teacher. “He picks apart every detail, from the right breathing technique to the proper vocal release,” he said. “But if we have a personal problem, he is not just our teacher. He is also like our kuya (brother).”

Since its inception, AOL’s long-term goal is to put up its own music school to also give employment to its scholars.

But financial and logistical problems hinder the fulfillment of this dream. In addition, AOL needs a good and accessible location for students with visual impairment. At present, St. Paul University lends the group a room to rehearse.

Access to quality education and equal opportunity for employment are mandated by the Magna Carta for Persons with Disabilities, or Republic Act No. 7277. With the thrust for inclusive education, more efforts are directed toward mainstreaming students with special needs in regular schools. However, the lack of accessibility and reasonable accommodation makes it difficult for persons with disabilities to participate on an equal basis with those without disabilities.

Go said the country still lacks materials to teach music to people who have low vision or are blind. Braille music books are hard to come by in the Philippines, compared to other countries such as the United States.

“If there is a song or piece that I want to teach to my students, I have to ask for somebody to read the notes for me, or record the whole piece,” he said. “I study it through listening, and only then can I teach it. It takes a longer time that way.”

Even in UP, the country’s lone national university, resources for visually impaired students are limited. Despite the opening of a music theory class for visually impaired students last school year in the College of Music in UP Diliman, the lack of resources forces Go and another blind teacher to use their own materials to teach Braille music notation to students.

As an educator with disability in the Philippines, Go said there are still a lot of challenges. Apart from physical barriers, the Filipino attitude toward disability is a work in progress.

“They think we (persons with disabilities) are pitiful. This is something that society should overcome,” he said, adding that there is still a huge need for facilities and resources for persons with disabilities like him.

As he continues to work for a bigger goal, Go feels happy where his passion has taken him and his students.

“Through music, we can show the people, the world, what we can do,” he said. “Through music, we can let them see that we can.”

Ambassadors of Light Script

(The author recently graduated with a journalism degree from the University of the Philippines-Diliman. She submitted this story for the journalism seminar class “Reporting on Persons with Disabilities” under VERA Files trustee Yvonne T. Chua.)

Text and photos by MARIA FEONA IMPERIAL

THERE is still no Persons with Disability Affairs Office (PDAO) in Valenzuela City but programs and services for PWDs extend beyond what an actual office could provide.

Ma. Kristina Ramos, focal person for PWD affairs, said there is already an ordinance for the creation of a PDAO but the law has yet to be implemented.

However, the quality of the programs and services for PWDs matters more than an office, Ramos insists. In the meantime, PWD concerns are accommodated mainly in the city social welfare department office and the Disabled Persons Affairs Committee (DPAC).

Established in 1996, the DPAC is composed of the heads of different local government units, and receives an annual budget of P500,000 to P1,000,000 directly from the local government.

Ramos says they have different sources of funding. For instance, funds for medicines are drawn from the city’s Emergency Welfare Program, while therapy needs fall under the annual PWD budget.

Valenzuela has clinics for physical, occupational and speech therapy, Ramos said.

A total of 9,344 PWDs are registered and have PWD IDs but according to the survey done by the city government, there are 20,000.

Beyond the basic provision of assistive devices, the CSWD also conducts home visitation services that cover the educational, health and employment needs of PWDs who cannot visit their office.

Ramos said the priority is for PWDs to have “easy access” for these services.

The CSWD office is located at the ground floor of the Valenzuela City Hall, where there are ramps in every entrance and accessible toilets in all floors.

The PWD affairs unit, Ramos said, is focused on conducting a survey among PWDs to assess their needs, concerns and strengths, among others. This is key to having a comprehensive program for PWDs, she pointed out.

For the longest time, she added, surveys paid little attention to the needs of PWDs. She hopes that through this one, they would be able to come up with credible data.

Text and photos by VERLIE Q. RETULIN

ON Aug. 1, 2014, Marikina’s PDAO was established in accordance with the PWD Code of Marikina. It is being manned by three personnel, all with orthopedic disability.

It is temporarily housed inside the City Social Welfare and Development office, although promises were made to have their own office someday. “Ang importante, nagsisimula kami. May isang table, may isang computer, isang typewriter — nag-uumpisa palang talaga (The important thing is that we’ve already started on something. We already have a table, a computer, a typewriter–we are just really starting)” Gil Flores, one of the three personnel there, said.

They are also waiting to gain access to their own budget. Meanwhile, the Mayor’s Office provides the money needed to finance their activities. Flores said they will organize and gather data on the number and profiles of PWDs in every barangay first.

There are more than 2,600 PWDs in Marikina, based on the number of PWD IDs issued as of June 2015.

Text and photos by VERLIE Q. RETULIN

THE City’s Persons with Disabilities Office is located inside the Mayor’s Coordinating Office at the Cuneta Astrodome, and is under the supervision of Pasay Social Welfare Development Office. It has yet to have its own office space and its own budget.

“Kung may PDAO na po kami, may sarili na po kaming budget, makakahanap po kami ng sariling office. Ito po nakiki-office lang kami. Nakikisiksik lang kami diyan. Meron lang kaming table (Once we have our own PDAO, we can have own budget and we can set up our own office. Right now, we only share an office (with another local government agency). What we have is only a table),” Hilda Cristobal, Vice President of Pasay Federation of PWD, said.

There are no PWDs in the office—not even its focal person, according to Cristobal.

Pasay has 201 barangays, and Cristobal said there were efforts for each barangay to have their own PWD desks. As of January 2015, there are 2,071 PWDs in Pasay.