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By JAKE SORIANO,
VERA Files

MANILA — Described as a “complete enumeration” of the entire Philippine population, the 2015 Census has ignored crucial data on a significant sector: persons with disabilities (PWD).

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“It’s an outright denial of the rights of persons with disabilities to be counted,” said a fuming Carmen Zubiaga, National Council on Disability Affairs (NCDA) Acting Executive Director.

On Thursday, leaders of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) who met in Manila included PWDs in their declaration, saying they “recognize the significance of enabling the full participation of all sectors and segments of our society.”

PWDs are mentioned thrice in the 2015 declaration, which capped the recently concluded APEC Economic Leaders Meeting (AELM).

“I am personally so disappointed with the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) for not consulting (PWDs) or even NCDA for the 2015 census,” Zubiaga said in an email to VERA Files.

Sought for comment, PSA only said, “(The) main objective of the 2015 Census of Population (POP CEN 2015) is to update the population count. Question on disability will be included in the 2020 Census of Population and Housing (2020 CPH).”

Yet, this runs counter to what the PSA itself says on its website as the main goal of the exercise: not to simply count the population but to provide useful data.

PSA did not respond to further follow-up questions, but did provide copies of the basic questionnaire it used in the 2015 census.

The form gathers information on names of household members, relationship to the household head, sex, date of birth, age, birth registration, marital status, religious affiliation, school attendance, literacy, highest grade/year completed, technical/ vocational course obtained, if overseas wor-ker or not, and usual activity/ occupation.

The non-inclusion of disability questions in the census would make the country remiss in its obligation as a signatory to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of PWDs (UNCRPD).

“The seven targets mentioning disability must be monitored with specific disability indicators or by disaggregating indicators by disability,” noted the UNCRPD Secretariat.

Lack of data at the national level “contributes to the invisibility of persons with disabilities in official statistics, presenting an obstacle to achieving development planning and implementation that is inclusive of persons with disabilities,” it said.

The Washington Group on Disability Statistics, formed in 2001 and operating under the UN Statistical Commission, has developed a set of six questions which can be included in national censuses and surveys to collect data on PWDs.

The Philippines is not among the countries listed by the CRPD Secretariat as having included Washington Group questions in their last census. Southeast Asian neighbors that have done so include Indonesia (2010), Timor-Leste (2010) and Vietnam (2009).

Disability questions, however, have been included in previous censuses in the country. Results of the 2010 census show that of the 92.1 million household population, 1.57 percent or some 1.4 million persons had disability.

Calabarzon had the highest number of PWDs (193,000) followed by the National Capital Region (167,000). The region with the lowest number was the Cordillera Administrative Region (26,000).

There were more males (50.9 percent of the total) than females (49.1 percent) with disabilities. Disability was highest among Filipinos aged 5 to 19 years.

The total number of PWDs based on the 2010 census showed an increase from the 942,098 PWDs counted during the 2000 census. The 1995 census had an even lower number of PWDs at 919,292.“We also want to remind PSA that they have to declare how they spent their budget on disability based on Section 34 of the General Appropriations Act,” she said.

That section of the national budget mandates a 1 percent allotment in the budgets of agencies for projects that address the needs of PWDs and senior citizens.

“(PWDs) are lamenting this act of excluding disability in the 2015 census,” Zubiaga said. (Vera Files)

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