Disability no barrier

 LIVING with disability is no barrier for 18-year-old Isabella Kila who is determined to become a human rights lawyer one day.

Isabella revealed her story at the St Lwanga High School in NCD during the opening of new classrooms yesterday.

She is in Grade 10 and hails from Rigo district in Central province.

She comes from a family of five and has a bigger dream than just being someone confined to a wheelchair for the rest of her life. 

Isabella said when she was born at the Port Moresby General Hospital, she was taken away from the mother who never knew until 30 minutes later that she was disabled. 

“My mother got the shock of her life and couldn’t believe what she saw. 

She enrolled at the Cheshire Home Disability Service Centre where she learnt to read, write and do things that an able person could do. 

“After some years, teachers saw that I was capable to cope with the able students so I graduated and was enrolled in Philip Aravare Primary School in 2005.

“But it was a totally different environment because I was most of the time laughed at and I felt out of place and hopeless,” she said.

Issabella said it did not stop her as she tried to do everything anyone else could do. Only then did students start to recognise that she was a special person.