Living Conditions In Lesotho: Disability Study

Introduction

Lesotho is a developing country and additional factors, namely poverty, food instability, the HIV/AIDS epidemic, and the reliance on development aid have attributed to the exclusion of people with disabilities (PWD) from society (United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), 2006, p. 6). In Lesotho, PWD confront multiple barriers when attempting to participate in society. These barriers can be visible or invisible and prevent PWD participating in mainstream society by hindering them from accessing education, employment, health services, public buildings, and public transport (Matsoha-Makhoali, 2015).

Living conditions in Lesotho for PWD differ in urban and rural regions. Therefore, this paper will focus primarily on how

The lack of job opportunities has lead to thousands of males migrating for work at South African mines and remittances from migrant workers contribute to the economy (UNDP, 2006, p. 8). In rural communities, livelihoods rely heavily on international agricultural subsistence and imports from South Africa; this is due to the low agricultural production due to only ten per cent of Lesotho’s land is farmable (UNDP, 2016). Lesotho is a member of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and depends excessively on funds from the SACD to subsidise a substantial quantity of the national budget (UNDP, 2016). The World Bank recently reported that Lesotho’s economic growth slowing down “mostly due to lower growth in South Africa, lower global growth prospects, and the drought” (2016).

Lesotho has the third highest HIV/AIDS prevalence in the world (UNDP, 2016). According to UNAIDS (2015, p. 2) report; 23 per cent of the population are living with HIV/AIDS. As a result of this pandemic “development gains have been lost and efforts to reduce poverty and improve living standards have been severely undermined (UNDP, 2006, p.

(2011, p. 667).

Global South Disability Perspective

Global South is a recent defination that has replaced former terms such as ‘Developing Countries’ or ‘Third World. The Global South term is frequently use by bureaucrats and academic to explain “world poverty” (Therien, 1999, p. 723).

In 2007, the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) defined disability as a;

… long-term physical, mental, intellectual or sensory impairments which in interaction with various barriers may hinder their full and effective participation in society on an equal basis with others.

However, as Meekosah and Soldatic highlights that people living in the Global South do not recongnise the concept of being disabled