ROMANIA: Romania's blind and visually-impaired protest to attract attention to their desperate situation

Record ID: 574167

  • Title: ROMANIA: Romania's blind and visually-impaired protest to attract attention to their desperate situation
  • Date: 14th March 2013
  • Summary: SHOW: BUCHAREST, ROMANIA (RECENT) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF BLIND PEOPLE PROTEST OUTSIDE ROMANIAN GOVERNMENT BUILDING PROTESTERS SHOUTING IN ROMANIAN: "ALL HANDICAPPED PEOPLE LOVE EACH OTHER LIKE BROTHERS" PROTESTERS SHOUTING IN ROMANIAN: "WE DON'T WANT TO BEG, WE WANT TO WORK" PROTESTER WITH BANNER, READING IN ENGLISH: "NOTHING ABOUT US WITHOUT US" (SOUNDBITE) (Romanian) PROTESTER FROM BACAU, LUCIAN, SAYING: "I'm from Bacau, I came here to protest as the benefits we receive have not been increased since 2008. We receive between 230 (53 euro) and 290 lei (66 euro)." PROTESTERS (SOUNDBITE) (Romanian) PROTESTER FROM SATU MARE, RADU, SAYING: "If our printing house doesn't work, pharmacies will not have prescriptions with Braille text, so when the blind go to a pharmacy to buy drugs, they won't know what they are getting." PROTESTERS HOLDING UP THEIR WALKING CANES BUCHAREST, ROMANIA (MARCH 13, 2013) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF VISUALLY-IMPAIRED MAN BURNING CDS WITH BOOKS FOR BLIND PRESIDENT OF ROMANIA'S BLIND ASSOCIATION, RADU RUBA, IN OFFICE ICON (SOUNDBITE) (Romanian) PRESIDENT OF ROMANIA'S BLIND ASSOCIATION, RADU RUBA, SAYING: "More and more (blind) people do not have any income other than the state payment. They receive no salaries, or pensions, state support is their only source of income. That's why the situation has become so desperate, it has not been dealt with for years." STREET SIGN ALERTING TO POSSIBLE PRESENCE OF BLIND PEOPLE DUMITRU BOC AND HIS WIFE ENTERING HOUSE VARIOUS OF DUMITRU BOC AND HIS WIFE MAKING COFFEE PORTRAIT OF DUMITRU BOC AND HIS WIFE SOUNDBITE (Romanian) BLIND DUMITRU BOC, SAYING: "I repeat, with full responsibility for what I say: Romanian society is not ready to accept handicapped people, especially the blind." BUCHAREST, ROMANIA (RECENT) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF BLIND PROTEST IN FRONT OF ROMANIAN GOVERNMENT HEADQUARTERS
  • Embargoed: 29th March 2013 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Romania
  • Country: Romania
  • Topics: Health,Politics,People
  • Reuters ID: LVAAX70W4AOXTJ9IQQII7TCODB3A
  • Story Text: Romania's blind community claim they are being adversely affected by the country's austerity measures and have stepped up their fight to attract the government's attention to their situation.
    About 500 members of the country's Association of The Blind travelled to Bucharest from various regions to stage a protest and demand increase of state pay to blind and visually-impaired people.
    Romania, the EU's second-poorest member state, is clawing its way out of a deep recession after taking austerity measures required for an International Monetary Fund-led bailout. The southeast European country, where the average wage is around 350 euros a month, had the fastest economic growth rate in the European Union until a real estate and credit bubble burst in 2008.

    "I'm from Bacau, I came here to protest as the benefits we receive have not been increased since 2008. We receive between 230 (53 euro) and 290 lei (66 euro)," said Lucian who came to Bucharest to join the protest from Bacau, 300 kilometres north of the capital.
    The Association has over 80,000 members, while there are 130,000 people with vision deficiencies in Romania. The problems are not just in meagre benefits they say, but in the lack of opportunities.

    "We don't want to beg, we want to work," read a poster held by one protester. For many state benefits are the only source of income, with the president of Romania's Blind Association Radu Ruba claiming the state has ignored the problems of handicapped people for years.

    "More and more (blind) people do not have any income other than the state payment. They receive no salaries, or pensions, state support is their only source of income. That's why the situation has become so desperate, it has not been dealt with for years," said Ruba.
    A lack of support for the blind's special printing house, which publishes everything from textbooks, to prescriptions using the Braille tactile writing system - is another issue.

    "If our printing house doesn't work, pharmacies will not have prescriptions with Braille text, so when the blind go to a pharmacy to buy drugs, they won't know what they are getting," said Radu who came to join the protest all the way from Satu Mare, 600 kilometres north-east of Bucharest.
    Dumitru Boc and his wife Dorina are blind and pensioners. Dumitru recalls that life for handicapped people was better in the Communist times and says that modern society does not care about them.

    "I repeat, with full responsibility for what I say: Romanian society is not ready to accept handicapped people, especially the blind."
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