November 26, 2013/Tuesday Lab Session, EDD Speaker talks about: the challenges that she has faced

as a young woman with disability, more generally the challenges faced by people with disabilities in the Philippines and the campaigns that she has participated in as a member of Young Voices in bringing about social change. (8 mins.)

Ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon. I am Dianne Mallari, 21 years of age, from Manila, Philippines, and an active member of Young Voices program for seven years now. I acquired my disability through bone cancer way back nine years. Being a young woman with disability really takes a lot of courage, hope and positivity to live just like a person without disability, most especially if you are in a developing country like the Philippines. The issues and challenges I have faced ever since I acquired my disability were the negative attitudes and discrimination in society which made it more difficult for me to go to school, to access public transportation, health care and social services. In my case as a person with amputation, the biggest challenges are the physical and structural barriers in the environment. Most of the establishments are not accessible and I have to use the stairs. The pedestrian lanes are also not PWD-friendly and the ramps are very stiff. There is not even a standard - designed bus or jeepney for a wheelchair or crutches-user like me. These physical barriers made my everyday life much harder. In the Philippines, people with disabilities (PWDs) are among the most marginalized in the society. Moreover, the persons with disabilities are building confidence, knowledge, and visibility but our opportunities like for participating in decision-making forums are still very limited. We feel that our ideas, views and concerns are not seriously taken by the decision-makers. We also feel that our opportunities are being denied due to negative attitudes, discrimination and barriers to access that make it harder for us to succeed. My disability itself didnt bring me down and I have not simply allowed myself to become an object of pity. Instead, it served as my inspiration to push hardly myself that is why I sincerely joined the Young Voices program, to actively speak out for the implementation of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities which is mainly to promote, protect and ensure the rights of every person with disability. Among the campaigns which I had participated in to bring about change was called May PWD ID Ako, Kasali Ako or in English I Have a PWD ID, I belong, a call for action by Young Voices Philippines. It aims to ensure that PWDs are recognized, registered and issued PWD ID cards for them to fully enjoy their rights and privileges. We educated the people especially the youth with disabilities in the isolated areas with the information on the importance of a PWD ID card and assisted them on how to register in their respective areas. Another campaign that I have taken part in up to now is the music advocacy. We, the Young Voices write and produce original music. The compositions are all about the abilities of youth with disabilities, changing the world one song at a time and inspiring to change the way people see disability. We named

our group Musikability, a combination of Music and ability. The groups name directly gives a positive thought to our audience. As of now, we have produced three original Christmas songs, one pop love song and one Young Voices theme song. We also have six cover songs. We had radio guestings and performed on air. Our songs were also played by radio stations. And we were often invited now to perform in different events. Our songs and music video have been played, shared and downloaded over the Social Networking Sites such as Facebook, Youtube, Twitter and Soundcloud. We have just submitted an entry to a widely known songwriting competition in the country. We have been receiving invitations from people and groups who have discovered us through Youtube. For these positive impacts, the Musikability is inspired enough in bringing about social change. We also had a very successful campaign through courtesy calls to Light Rail Transit in the Metropolitan. It was like two years or more that they had no accessibility features such as elevators, ramps and operational escalators in their stations. After the courtesy call and dialogue attended by the Young Voices members and the officials of Light Rail Transit, we had an ocular inspection, and we were amazed that there were really developments. Some of the PWD passengers in the said train recognized our efforts and action and it was very fulfilling as an advocate. We also produce short films that portray not only the issues and challenges but the capabilities of the young people with disabilities. The films are being published and shared in the Social Networking sites such as Facebook, Youtube and Twitter to promote awareness and sensitivity. These films were submitted also to some of the film festivals like the Manhattan Film Festival. I, myself together with another Young Voices member was also discovered with our abilities as masters of ceremonies through the advocacy programs led by Young Voices. And with that, we are now invited by other organizations to host events. Recently, I joined a national essay writing contest joined by almost two hundred student leaders in the Philippines. I wrote about Young Voices program believing that it will help us to promote our group and our objectives. I won the third place in the competition and got felicitations from the people who had read my essay. I would also like to mention the good initiatives of the Young Voices chapters in the Philippines. Young Voices campaigners were involved in the monitoring of National Election last May 2013, and conducted accessibility audit to some polling centers. We also took part in the development and production of sensitivity video in assisting the persons with disabilities during National Election. Through the leadership of Young Voices, the Philippine National Police has launched and established PWD help desk in one of the provinces in the country. The help desk is mainly to assist the PWDs in filling complaints. We also conducted disability sensitivity trainings to the Light Rail and Metro Rail Transit Authorities, NGOs and other peoples organizations.

Let us help one another in changing the attitudes of the people towards disability and if there is one more thing that I wanted to tell you is that we will not stop until we realize our rights. Thank you and once again, good afternoon!