Background

The HRIC has been awarded a UKRI/AHRC GCRF urgency grant of £90,000 to develop a case study on the impacts of COVID-19 on persons with disabilities. This project brings together experts from the University of Bristol and YOLRED (a Ugandan community-based NGO) to implement a disability-inclusive and led research project, to assess the impact of COVID-19 on war-affected disabled populations, including former child soldiers, in Northern Uganda. This research will utilise innovative participatory-action based workshops which are led by people with war-related disabilities. It will centre 16 persons with disabilities (PWD hereafter) living in Northern Uganda by employing them on temporary contracts and making them co-researchers and co-producers of this research, and part of the project team. The team will work together to provide new evidence to produce a disability-specific and inclusive situational analysis for Northern Uganda (amongst other outputs), which will address the needs of PWD who have been excluded from pandemic safety and recovery measures.

Project partner, Geoffrey Omony (executive director of YOLRED) stated:

“We are very excited to be partnering with the University of Bristol Law School on this project. For YOLRED, it is especially important to build the self-esteem of our beneficiaries and one of the ways we will do this is by centring persons with disabilities throughout the whole project, including the designing and gathering of data, in the output creation and production, and through their presence and participation at the stakeholder events, which will, I hope, boost their confidence and morale but also determine how they wish to be treated in future such projects. This is at the core of the way YOLRED operates, i.e. ‘Nothing about us without us’”.

Co-researchers will comprise of 6 ex-child combatants, 6 non-combatants, and 4 persons with non-war related disabilities, with at least 50% women (to support sustainable development goals 5 (gender equality) and 10.2 (reduced inequalities); as both women with disabilities and ex-child soldiers with disabilities remain two of the most stigmatised and impoverished groups in the region, bringing these groups together also attends to sustainable development goal 16 (peace, justice and strong institutions), and doubles as a peacebuilding, reintegration and empowerment effort, and ensures inclusivity of further marginalised populations. Findings will inform disability-inclusive pandemic recovery strategies for Uganda by promoting research uptake amongst policymakers and with UNPRPD Uganda; findings, data and outputs will also be scalable to other war-affected and post-conflict regions.

Update

The policy report is published on 3 December 2022. 

Read the full policy report here: “The response to Covid-19 in Northern Uganda should be disability-inclusive."