Using the disabled against law

By JIMMY KALEBE
USING disabled persons to make money for a living is wrong and it is against the law, according to a magistrate.
Lae District Court Magistrate Tera Dawai said nowadays, people were using disabled persons to set them up in streets around towns and cities to get money or telling them to do street vending to get money.
“This is wrong and it’s against the law and also the human rights law,” he said when convicting Erick Gamai (person with disability), 29, from Kabriman village, Angoram, East Sepik.
“A lot of times, disabled persons use their disabilities to do something which is wrong.”
Gamai was put on a 12-month good behaviour bond without surety.
Magistrate Dawai also ordered Gamai not to sell in public without a licence and not to taken illicit spirits or drugs in the 12 months.
“I am not happy,” he said.
“Abled people are using these disabled persons as money-making objects and this is bad.”
Magistrate Dawai told Gamai that the law was made for all despite the status of a person and it did not take into account whether you were disabled person or not.
Police arrested Gamai on Aug 4 while he was selling cigarettes and Eaglewood body spray along 6th Street in Lae’s Top Town area.
Police saw him and stopped and asked him to remove his table market but he refused and told the police: “I did not do anything, I have rights.”
Magistrate Dawai told Gamai that he had rights but he was doing his business at a wrong place which the law did not allow.
He cautioned Gamai and told him to abide by the court order and refrain from vending in public places.