Independent Election Meets Persons with Disabilities
March 17, 2022 In light of preparations for the elections for provincial councils, municipal councils and the Amman Secretariat Council, a dialogue meeting with persons with disabilities was held today at the Headquarters of the Authority in the presence of members of the Board of Commissioners. Dr. Zuhair Abu Fares stressed the independent election commission's keenness to communicate with people with disabilities as an original partner in the electoral process and have the right to exercise their political and civil rights and enable them to participate as voters, candidates, workers, and volunteers in the elections.
He added that the concerned authorities for the rights of persons with disabilities have a great responsibility to serve this group and defend its interests and the authority is ready to work to overcome all obstacles to their participation in the electoral process, noting that the biggest challenge faced by the Authority is the lack of a database of persons with disabilities to allow the Authority to distribute them to the ballot boxes and polling stations qualified to receive them, and until this is done, the Authority has worked on substantial amendments in the executive instructions allowing persons with easy voting In basements such as polling stations and counting within a mechanism on which polling and counting committees have been trained.
Dr. Abir Dabaneh, a member of the Board of Commissioners, also stressed that all facilities should be provided to persons with disabilities to exercise their political, social and economic rights, while praising the steps taken by Jordan, where we were among the countries leading to the demand for a political and humanitarian right to privilege those with disabilities by ratifying the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and passing the Persons with Disabilities Act. Ammar al-Husseini, a member of the Board of Commissioners of the Authority, said that in the 19th parliamentary elections in 2020, the commission had announced the places of qualified and accredited polling stations for persons with disabilities, 23 centers distributed to the constituencies at the rate of one center for each district, adding that the authority invited persons with disabilities to review the Department of Civil Status and Passports and apply for inclusion in the voters' lists in the designated centers, in accordance with the executive instructions for the preparation of voter tables. At the end of the meeting, there was an extensive dialogue in which the Commission answered the questions and inquiries of the audience
