Goal: $231, 600

Rwanda has made commendable progress in protecting and promoting the human rights of people with special needs. The Law stipulates that “the disabled person has the right to appropriate education, in accordance with the state of his/her disability”. Similarly, there is an institutional framework that ensures the advocacy and representation of people with special needs. For example, the National Council of Persons with Disabilities (NCPD) is a public body entrusted with a mandate to advocate for the needs of people with disabilities, while the law requires that they must be represented in the parliament. Awareness of inclusive education has made some reaps too but special initiatives to support people with intellectual disabilities are predominantly from the civil society who establish specialized centers. 

In fact, in Rwanda, international commitments relating to children with disabilities are “partly achieved through specific services provided to children with disabilities in a number of centers largely run by non-state partners (e.g. Church-Based Organizations, Non-Governmental Organizations (s) and parent groups”. The assessment noted that 15 residential centers, 20 mixed (residential with someday users), and 14 daycare centers operate in the country, giving a total of 49 centers. 71% of the centers offer residential care and 29% offer daycare services to children with disabilities. TUBITEHO is one of the non-state actors who contribute to solving the education and care needs of children with intellectual disabilities.

Transport challenges for TUBITEHO Day Care Center 

In the City of Kigali (CoK), student transport is provided by private transportation companies such as Jali Holdings Ltd, Rwanda Federation of Transport Cooperatives (RFTC), and Volcano. In line with inclusive transport, RFTC has dedicated 11 buses that facilitate the movement of people with physical disabilities. For the time being learners at TUBITEHO Daycare Center have been using public transport facilities. 

Since 2015, transport costs in Kigali have increased. The increase has negatively affected the families of children and young people with intellectual disabilities cared for by TUBITEHO Day Care but also on our organization and our service delivery. This has required parents to share the cost of the transport cost which affects the budgets of both parents and the NGO. Also, the transport services available for the general public and learners, in particular, are not appropriate for learners with intellectual disabilities for some reasons:

• RFTC is the only company that has inclusive transport facilities. However, this company is not allowed by the Rwanda Regulatory and Utilities Agency (RURA) to operate in the zone where TUBITEHO Daycare Center is located (it only operates in zone III and IV);

• Even if the Daycare center would be located in the zone where RFTC is allowed to operate, the services would not be accessed easily because it would target all passengers with disabilities regardless of the specificities of their disability such as intellectual ones. As a matter of fact, while it is possible to hire such buses (we indeed hire Volcano Express), the cost is very high (we pay 1,150,000Rwfs for transportation the learners for 20 days in a month);

4. Proposed Solution 

This project proposal aims at availing transport facilities tailored to the transport of children and young people with intellectual disabilities. This would result in: (1) a timely arrival at school and home for learners, (2) increased time spent at school with professional caretakers, and (3) appropriate and secured transport of learners, which ultimately helps learners to be socially and economically integrated, (4) parents rest assured that children are safely transported while at the same time they shoulder a lighter burden of affording the transport costs. This requires three buses to pick and drop children from varius directions of the city as described below: