Cape Town - Democratic Alliance leader Helen Zille launched a Braille version of her party's 2014 election manifesto on Tuesday.
“This is a first for South Africa. Following this handover today, we will make copies of this Braille manifesto available at every DA office in the country,” she said, speaking at the headquarters of the organisation League of Friends of the Blind (LOFOB) in Grassy Park, Cape Town.
The manifesto - titled “Together for Change, Together for Jobs” - would also be available at all provincial offices of the SA National Council of the Blind, at the Grahamstown Library for the Blind, at LOFOB, and at the disability desks of universities around the country.
“We are doing this at substantial cost to the DA, but we believe it is necessary so that visually impaired South Africans can engage in the political process fully.”
Zille said decision-makers and politicians had been “slow off the mark” in understanding that, for the visually impaired, Braille was literacy.
“It is not enough to say the right thing. It is essential to follow through with concrete action steps,” she said.
According to the SA National Council for the Blind, there are about one million blind and partially-sighted people in South Africa. - Sapa