The concern was raised recently during a parliamentary commission sitting.
Rwanda lacks disaggregated data focusing on people living with disability, making it difficult to draft appropriate policies to respond to their needs, Rwanda Today has learnt.
The concern was raised recently during a parliamentary commission sitting, during which lawmakers expressed concern over lack of reliable data to guide decision makers and policy.
Assessment carried out by Rwanda Governance Board revealed that lack of statistics of persons living with disability could cause poor planning for interventions to their specific needs.
According to the 2012 general census, the latest available figures, the country has 446,453 persons with disabilities. Eugene Mussolini, representing persons with disabilities in parliament, said lack of updated data affects planning.
“Even the 2012 census was not exhaustive for persons with disabilities. Even the categorization that would map individuals and how they could be supported, have never gone public.
We still have hope because our inclusive leadership always put us into consideration, but we still have a gap of database that would inform proper planning,” Mr. Mussolini told Rwanda Today.
Though, experts emphasise the importance of statistics in planning.” You cannot know people’s priorities without statistics, even the census gives a general picture of the population, it doesn’t go deeper in specific cases. Statistics help know the seriousness of the problem, that helps plan accordingly. Whatever you can do without statistics, it’s just groping,” Teddy Kaberuka, economist, told Rwanda Today.
Ignatienne Nyirarukundo, the Minister of State in Charge of Social Affairs in the Ministry of Local Government, said the upcoming general census of 2022 will give updated statistics.
She also said that there is an IT based system that will help collect necessary data. “It’s true, there are no current figures. But we have built a system that will show us individuals, their locations and their needs,” she told Parliament’s Commission of Politics, Gender and Gender Equality in National Development.