A Cry for Help!

The International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF), defines disability as an umbrella term for impairments, activity limitations and participation restrictions. Disability is the interaction between individuals with a health condition (for example, cerebral palsy, down syndrome and depression) and personal and environmental factors such as negative attitudes, inaccessible transportation and public buildings and social supports.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates that there are over one billion disabled people in the world. This corresponds to about 15 percent of the world’s population, which is estimated to number 7.132 billion by the United States Census Bureau (USCB). With a population of over 24 million, Ghana has a disability population of about 15-20 percent. The common disabilities are physical, visual, sensory and mental.

My quest to review the struggles average Ghanaians face in making a living in Accra reached the turn of Isaac Asante. He is disabled. According to him, he was not born disabled until age five, when he became crippled. He narrated that the cause of his disability is still unknown.

Isaac is 29 years old and comes from Akuapim Adukrom in the eastern region of Ghana. He has lived in Accra for nine years. According to him, he had been begging for alms for six years of which he saved money to start his business. He is a traffic hawker and has been selling for three years. He sells air fresher, hair and shoe brushes, and shaving sticks among others. All other things being equal, he makes sales between 20 and 30 cedis a day.

Isaac sleeps in front of a store at Makola, a commercial hub of Accra in the night. He told me that he pays 90 pesewas before he uses the lavatory. According to him, he came to Accra to make a living because poverty has engulfed his family. He is the fourth son of his parents’ 12 children.

He appealed that he would be very thankful if he is provided with accommodation and store, where he can sell his items. Isaac also confided in me that he would like to get married when his dream of getting house and store comes to reality. He is therefore calling on government, charitable organisations and philanthropists to come to his aid.

The Plight of a Teenager

                                                                                                              

        

 

One of the major problems that is affecting Ghana and the world today is child labour. Child labour can be seen as children below the working age being forced or compelled due to circumstances to work at the expense of enjoying basic privileges such as education, good health and other social amenities.

According to research, broken homes resulting in single parenthood is one of the contributing factors of child labour in Ghana of which my community is no exception. The single parent under such difficult situation may be financially handicapped to cater for her children. In view of this, a child who is determined to be in school is sent by his/her parent onto the street or elsewhere to work to make a living and to pay for his/her fees.

One fine afternoon after some Ghanaians had watched the partial eclipse of the sun in a fantastic and fanciest frenzy, I chanced on this sugarcane seller. He is called Joseph Boadi. Joseph is a thirteen year old boy, who is in class six. According to him, they are four in the family and his parents are not in a good job to provide for their basic needs. Because of this, he has been asked by his parents to sell sugarcane so as to earn a little amount of money to support him and the family. Joseph told me that poverty compelled his parents to settle in Accra to make a decent living for themselves. They come from a village in the Eastern Region of Ghana. But alas! Their expectation has been otherwise. He complained that the cost of living in the capital is very hard. Joseph narrated that he ought to sell from Monday to Sunday. Thus when he closes from school every week, he quickly goes out to do his business. He told me that selling under the scorching sun has been one of his challenges.

I inquisitively asked Joseph what he wants to become in future, he told me that he wants to become a Bank Manager. Hmm! What a great ambition to nurture. Can his dream become a reality in this struggle for survival to make a living and to cater for his education? It is only time that has the power to answer this question. May God see you through  this travailing time my good friend!

                                                         

                                                                                                                    

 video: Future Bank Manager, skillfully peeling a sugarcane for a customer.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            

                                                         

The Shame of Selling Popcorn

  

"I was divorced by my wife because I sell popcorn." These are not my words; they are the exact words of a popcorn vendor at the Makola Market in Accra. I was enveloped in fascination when I caught sight of this man in his late thirties with his younger brother struggling to make ends meet with the selling of popcorn on a truck. The name of this popcorn seller is Agbeshi.

On the truck were two popcorn machines: one for salt flavored roasted corn and the other for sugar flavored roasted corn powered by an electrical generator and engulfed with a boom of music for the attraction and entertainment of prospective buyers. This man is a trained mechanical engineer by profession with a National Vocational Training Institute (NVTI) certificate. He told me that he decided to add the popcorn business to his professional work because his latter work was not lucrative enough to sustain him and his family in the capital of Ghana.

Agbesi narrated that he has been in the popcorn business for over four years. As the business flourished, he married his divorced wife. They had married for two and half years. He recalled a time when he was having a nap in his room in one foggy afternoon; his wife broke the news to him that she wants to discontinue the marriage with him. He embraced the news with shock and anguish! He told me that his wife jilted him as a result of mounting pressure from her parents. His wife’s parents asked her to break up with him because he was a ‘nobody’: a common popcorn seller.

According to him, some people mock him because he sells popcorn. Sometimes he is hired for funerals to prepare his delicious and appetising popcorn to sympathizers. Some people tease him that he always prays that someone should die for him to be hired. As he rightly put it, ‘some people laugh at me whenever they see me sell popcorn at the funeral grounds.’

He complained that indeed the cost of living in Accra is very hard especially, where he has to pull the truck to sell in the streets of Makola and other vantage points from 3pm to 11pm. He was however quick to add that business has been quite lucrative. Agbeshi is now married with two children: twins. He excitedly enunciated  that he is a proud popcorn peddler. 

                                                                                                      

video:"I am a proud popcorn peddler"!