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No condition is permanent: How a seamstress apprentice became physically challenged
Stella Kpormegbe
54-year-old Trader at Ashaiman in the Greater Accra Region, Ms Stella Kpormegbe has cautioned disabled persons not to allow themselves to be married out because people have sympathy for them.
She said they (disabled persons) also had value and skills which they could bring on board in any relationship so under no circumstances should they be undermined.
She said these in an interview with The Spectator last Friday when she shared her experience as a disabled person and also to encourage others who have the same fate.
Ms Kpormegbe recalled that 30 years ago when she woke up from bed, she never imagined that something would happen to change her life forever.
She said she was going about her routine assignment for the day as a seamstress apprentice, and was boiling some water on a coal pot to bath when her left leg hit the coal pot and some of the boiling water splashed on her feet.
She said in an attempt to clean it, her right knee cap “twisted” and that was her journey to disability.
The trader said all attempts to get her back on her feet with traditional and orthodox medicines had been unsuccessful.
She said almost four years later, her right foot was amputated from what she learnt was a cancer of a sort and now she wears a prosthetic leg and supports it with crutches.
The native of Keta in the Volta Region said she had to accept the fact that things had changed and she had to start new life as a disabled person.
She said though it was a difficult decision to make, it reduced the mental agony on her and made her start learning to do things in a new way.
She said, at the time of the incident, she was married with a baby who was about a year-old and her husband was very helpful in seeking support to restore her health.
She said along the line she suspected that peer pressure and wrong counsel gave her husband a change in attitude and mind so he finally abandoned her for another woman.
She said that with the support of some of her family members and friends and the motivation she needed to be of sound mind to take care of her little child, she managed to put all the challenges behind her to move on.
Miss Kpormegbe admitted that life had not been easy but she had always encouraged herself and become a better version of herself despite her disability.
She said she was currently a proud grandmother with three grandchildren and also supporting her daughter to raise them with her son-in-law.
In a reaction to why she didn’t remarry, she said “many people seem to have a challenge getting involved with disabled persons because they feel they (disabled people) would be a burden on them”.
She said since she did not want to be married out of pity or be disrespected, she decided to take a break from relationship and concentrate on her drinking bar business.
She was optimistic that one day the right person would appreciate her situation and come around so that she could remarry.
She advised families of persons with disabled spouses to be supportive not resort to casting aspersions since that made life more difficult for them (disabled spouses) and with persons who were emotionally unstable, they could be forced to abandon their spouses just as in her case.
She said the society had more room for improvement as far as the relationship with the disabled community was concerned.
She disclosed that single persons especially females with disabilities struggled to get spouses because they were seriously discriminated against.
She said she had taken the task of counselling younger disabled women to be optimistic about life and give of their best as there was always a light at the end of the tunnel.
She said disabled persons if given the needed support could also contribute effectively to the development of society so they should be accepted, respected and welcomed like any abled persons in society.
From Dzifa Tetteh Tay, Ashaiman
The Member of Parliament for Nsawam Adoagyiri, Frank Annoh Dompreh, has expressed concern over delays in the release of the District Assemblies Common Fund, warning that the situation is stalling development across the country.
On his facebook page, he described as a matter of urgent national importance, the Minority Chief Whip pointed to what he sees as a growing crisis of unpaid contractors, abandoned projects, and halted infrastructure works in many districts.
He noted that several communities are grappling with half completed schools, unfinished health facilities, abandoned markets, deteriorating roads, and stalled sanitation projects.
According to him, many contractors who have executed projects for district assemblies have not been paid, forcing some construction firms to demobilise from sites while workers lose their jobs.
He stressed that the District Assemblies Common Fund is not a discretionary allocation but a constitutional requirement under Article 252 of the 1992 Constitution, intended to support development at the local level.
In his view, years of delayed releases and accumulated arrears have weakened district development financing and disrupted projects meant to improve living conditions in communities.
He further argued that some payments made in recent years were largely the settlement of old debts rather than funding for new or ongoing projects, a situation he believes has affected contractor confidence and local economic activity.
He described the issue as more than a budgetary challenge, characterising it as a development emergency and a governance concern.
He therefore urged the appropriate authorities to pay outstanding DACF arrears, settle contractors who have completed their work, and ensure that transfers to districts are automatic and predictable.
He maintained that decentralisation can only succeed when district assemblies receive adequate and timely funding to carry out development projects.
He emphasised that stalled projects directly affect ordinary citizens, since they rely on such infrastructure for education, healthcare, transportation, sanitation, and economic activities.
He called for renewed attention to grassroots development, insisting that national progress should not be concentrated only in major cities but extended to all communities.
By: Jacob Aggrey
Richard Appiah, the footballer who killed two children and stored part of their bodies in a fridge at Abesim in the Bono Region in 2021 has been handed a lifetime sentence.
This was after a five member panel of judges at the Accra High Court returned a verdict of guilty against the convict.
Appiah, 32, also a draughtsman would spend the rest of his life in prison after he was convicted of murder.
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BY MALIK SULLEMANA
