Does being handicapped mean you are a let-out? A let-out educationally and socially?
“No!” Said a handicap Paul Misalie Bangura.
This case may not be an isolated incident but it may be one of the rare cases that Sierra Leone is yet to make sense of only if it has to catch up with other nations that are signatories to the United Nations Millennium Development Goals.
20-year-old Misalie, without wrists, is a wonder to many that come across him.
Born handicapped, Paul has grappled with this condition to make himself a profitable Sierra Leonean. “Being handicapped does not mean you are a let-out,” commented Paul.
The handicapped, who goes about his house chores for himself and can even ride a bicycle, has a Basic Education Certificate from the West African Examination Council, an examination he took at the Bo Commercial Secondary School.
The orphan, who lost his father during the war, has also sat to the West African Senior School Certificate Examination at the Magburuka Government Boys School with the following results: government C6; History C5; Lang D7; Biology E8; Agriculture E8 and F9s in Mathematics and Geography.
The orphan who has high dreams told Awoko that, “education is a sort of inspiration to me. I don’t want to be a drop-out as is the case with many other handicapped.”
He further explained that he wished to sit to the WASSCE again but that since the departure of his sponsors, some white Seventh Day Adventist missionaries coupled with the death of his father, “Sierra Leone seems to me the worst place a handicapped could find himself. Everyday my dreams appear far and it is like this nation wants me to go to the streets to beg for my living.”
He went on to tell Awoko that he also wanted to proceed to the university and read for his first degree and “it is my dream to read law so that I will fight for the handicapped tomorrow as we are facing many problems like discrimination and many others.”
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