Fellow Nigerians with Disabilities,
Brothers and Sisters across the 36 States of the Federation and the Federal Capital Territory,
Today, as our beloved Nigeria marks its 66th Independence Anniversary, I bring you warm greetings, solidarity, and a renewed commitment to the dignity, rights and full participation of persons with disabilities in our national life.
On this important occasion, I reflect on the Independence Day Address delivered by His Excellency, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, GCFR, particularly his message of moving “From Reform to Prosperity.”
The President spoke of a Nigeria that has endured difficult years, undertaken significant reforms and confronted longstanding economic challenges. He spoke of the need to move beyond economic correction towards shared and widespread prosperity—a prosperity that is not measured only by economic figures, but by whether Nigerians can work, learn, access healthcare, feed their families, build businesses and look towards the future with confidence.
We welcome that aspiration.
But after more than two decades of active engagement in Nigeria’s disability rights movement, one question remains central:
Who is able to benefit from that progress?
Nigeria’s prosperity cannot be truly shared if persons with disabilities remain at the margins of its opportunities, institutions and decision-making processes.
For persons with disabilities, prosperity means more than a growing economy. It means being able to move around without physical and communication barriers; enter schools, hospitals, workplaces and public institutions independently and with dignity; access information in usable formats; obtain assistive devices; and participate meaningfully in employment, entrepreneurship, education, healthcare, justice and social protection.
It means that a young woman who is blind can pursue her ambitions, that a young man who is deaf can acquire skills without communication barriers, and that a person with a physical disability in a rural community does not have to choose between remaining at home and facing inaccessible transportation simply to access a public service.
This is what shared prosperity must mean for us.
Fellow Nigerians, the President spoke of productive work, enterprise, industrial growth and digital connectivity. Persons with disabilities share that ambition.
We are not asking to be spectators in Nigeria’s economic transformation. We want to be workers, entrepreneurs, employers, professionals, farmers, innovators, artisans, researchers, technology developers and investors.
We want opportunities to compete, with reasonable support where barriers—not lack of ability—stand in our way.
For too long, disability has been approached mainly through the lens of vulnerability and welfare. While social protection remains important, persons with disabilities must also be recognised as economic actors and contributors to national development.
That requires disability inclusion from the beginning of programme design—not as an addition after programmes have already been created.
When government designs employment programmes, when financial institutions develop products, when digital platforms are created, when infrastructure is constructed and when skills-development programmes are implemented, accessibility and reasonable accommodation must be considered from the outset.
Inclusion must move from the margins of programme design to the centre of national development planning.
Our young people with disabilities must also be part of Nigeria’s economic future. They have ambitions, qualifications, businesses, talents, ideas and dreams. Yet many continue to encounter barriers in education, skills acquisition, employment, access to finance, digital participation and leadership.
We therefore call for deliberate disability inclusion across youth-focused programmes and economic initiatives.
A programme cannot be genuinely inclusive simply because persons with disabilities are technically eligible to apply.
Eligibility without accessibility is not meaningful inclusion.
We need accessible application systems, training environments, learning materials and digital platforms, as well as reasonable accommodation, disability-inclusive financing and effective monitoring to determine whether young persons with disabilities are actually benefiting.
Our goal is not to create a separate economy for persons with disabilities. It is to remove the barriers that prevent us from participating fully in the Nigerian economy.
Fellow Nigerians, social protection is another important part of this conversation.
Persons with disabilities and their families often bear additional costs associated with assistive devices, personal assistance, transportation, communication, healthcare and rehabilitation. These costs may not always be visible in national statistics, but they are very real at the household level.
As Nigeria strengthens its social protection systems, disability must therefore be deliberately considered in their design, identification, targeting and monitoring.
Persons with disabilities deserve social protection where it is needed, but social protection should go hand in hand with access to education, healthcare, decent work and economic opportunity.
Protection and empowerment must go together.
Education must also open doors, not simply count classrooms.
A school is not inclusive simply because it has a classroom. A university is not accessible simply because a student with a disability has been admitted. An online learning platform is not inclusive simply because it is available on the internet.
True inclusion requires accessible infrastructure, learning materials, communication, technology, assessment systems and trained personnel.
As Nigeria becomes increasingly digital, we must also ensure that websites, applications, devices, training materials and public digital services do not create new barriers for citizens with disabilities.
Digital inclusion is now an essential component of national inclusion.
Fellow Nigerians, there is another matter we must address with maturity and clarity as we move towards the 2027 General Election.
Persons with disabilities must be recognised not merely as voters seeking attention from political actors, but as citizens with rights, responsibilities, aspirations and legitimate expectations from every political institution.
Persons with disabilities are not an afterthought in Nigeria’s democracy.
We are voters.
We are party members.
We are aspirants.
We are candidates.
We are campaigners.
We are political organisers.
We are election observers.
We are citizens.
We therefore call for accessible voter information, accessible campaign communication, accessible polling environments, reasonable accommodation, inclusive voter education and meaningful participation of persons with disabilities throughout the electoral process.
Political parties should also create meaningful space for persons with disabilities within party structures, candidate processes, policy development and leadership.
As manifestos are presented to Nigerians, disability inclusion should be addressed across areas including education, healthcare, employment, social protection, infrastructure, digital access, justice, humanitarian action and political participation.
The disability community, for its part, must remain engaged, informed and organised. We will listen to policies, examine commitments, engage institutions, ask questions and demand accountability while continuing to participate peacefully and constructively in Nigeria’s democratic process.
Our political participation must never be reduced to the number of votes we can deliver.
Fellow Nigerians, after more than two decades in the disability rights movement, one lesson has become increasingly clear:
Representation without influence is not enough.
It is not enough for persons with disabilities to be invited into a room after major decisions have already been made. It is not enough to mention disability in speeches without providing resources for implementation.
Persons with disabilities and their representative organisations must be involved from policy conception through implementation, monitoring and evaluation.
We must be part of the conversations shaping Nigeria’s prosperity, productivity, industrialisation, digital transformation and national development—not simply as beneficiaries at the end of the process, but as citizens helping to shape the process itself.
Nigeria has already established important legal and institutional foundations for disability inclusion, including the Discrimination Against Persons with Disabilities (Prohibition) Act, 2018 and the National Commission for Persons with Disabilities.
The challenge before us is implementation.
Laws must be reflected in budgets. Policies must be reflected in programmes. Accessibility must be reflected in infrastructure. Employment commitments must be reflected in workplaces. Participation must be reflected in decision-making. And accountability must be reflected in measurable results.
We therefore call on Ministries, Departments and Agencies, state and local governments, and public institutions to treat disability inclusion not as an optional addition to development planning, but as an integral part of their responsibility to the Nigerian people.
Fellow Nigerians with Disabilities,
Our circumstances may differ. Some live in cities, while others live in rural and hard-to-reach communities. Some have access to education and employment, while others continue to face exclusion, poverty, stigma and discrimination.
But across these differences, we share one fundamental truth:
We are citizens of Nigeria, and this country belongs to us too.
Let us continue to organise. Let us speak for ourselves. Let us strengthen our organisations and invest in young leaders. Let us create space for women with disabilities, children and young persons with disabilities, and persons with psychosocial, intellectual, developmental and other disabilities who experience multiple and intersecting forms of exclusion.
Let us remain united in our commitment to dignity, equality and rights. And as we approach another electoral cycle, let us participate with knowledge, responsibility and vigilance.
Our votes are our civic rights. Our voices are our civic responsibility. Our participation is our democratic power.
The President has spoken of moving from the age of reform to the age of prosperity.
For the disability community, we say:
Let this also be the age of inclusion.
Let prosperity mean that a child with a disability can enter school and learn; that a young person can acquire skills and secure decent work; that an entrepreneur can access finance without discrimination; that a woman with a disability can access healthcare and live with dignity; that public infrastructure and information are accessible; that technology expands participation rather than creates new barriers; and that persons with disabilities can sit at the tables where decisions affecting our lives and our country are made.
That is the Nigeria we seek.
Not a Nigeria built for persons with disabilities, but a Nigeria built with persons with disabilities.
Sixty-six years after independence, the Nigerian promise belongs to every citizen—the farmer, the trader, the worker, the student, the entrepreneur, the professional, the young person, the older person, and the Nigerian with a disability.
We have contributed to this country through difficult decades, and we will continue to contribute to its future.
We are not asking Nigeria to carry us. We are asking Nigeria to remove the barriers that prevent us from carrying our full share of the nation’s future.
As National President of the Joint National Association of Persons with Disabilities, I remain convinced that our strength lies not in waiting to be included, but in continuing to organise, engage, advocate, build partnerships and insist—peacefully and persistently—that the Nigerian project must belong to all of us.
So, on this 66th Independence Anniversary, let us renew not only our hope in Nigeria, but our commitment to building the Nigeria we deserve.
A Nigeria where rights are respected.
A Nigeria where opportunities are accessible.
A Nigeria where public resources serve everyone.
A Nigeria where political participation is meaningful.
A Nigeria where prosperity is shared.
And a Nigeria where disability is not a barrier to citizenship, dignity or opportunity.
May this Independence Day remind us that nation-building is the responsibility of all of us.
And persons with disabilities are ready to do our part.
Happy 66th Independence Anniversary, Nigeria.
God bless Nigerians with Disabilities.
God bless the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
Abdullahi Usman Aliyu
National President, JONAPWD
October 1, 2026
Abuja, Nigeria
