GROUP WANT MENTAL HEALTH BILL PASSED WITHOUT DELAY

Self-Help Groups of persons with mental illness and epilepsy and their primary caregivers in the Northern Region, have called on members of the country’s legislature to endeavor to speed up the passage of the Mental Health Bill without further delay. They also appealed to the government to consider setting aside a component of the District Assemblies Common Fund, for persons with mental illness just as it did for Persons With Disabilities. The 12 Self-Help Groups consisting of 216 people who came from 12 Districts, made the call at a workshop organized by BasicNeeds Ghana in the Tolon-Kumbungu District. During their two-day residential training workshop, they were taught how to advocate properly alongside with good communication and lobbying skills. According to Dokurugu Adam Yahaya, Community Projects Coordinator of the NGO, the objective of the workshop was to enable participants advocate effectively for support from duty bearers, towards addressing serious issues bothering on mental health at the district and community levels. Alhassan Mohammed Awal, facilitator of the workshop told participants that in advocacy, the issues must be well communicated through the right channels to the appropriate authority. According to him, as vulnerable groups they must be able to identify the issues they are faced with, the goals and objectives, target audience, build support, develop the message, identify channels of communication and raise funds before implementing them. Adding that, anything short of this procedure, they would fail to achieve their objective. Meanwhile, the new Mental Health Bill drafted in 2004, though delayed for many years, seeks, when finally passed into law, to improve the care of poor, vulnerable people with mental illness or epilepsy, safeguard their human rights and promote their participation in restoration and recovery. BasicNeeds since 2002 has reached 18,838 people with mental illness or epilepsy from over 18,700 families, together with 18,335 care-givers in Northern Ghana and some parts of Accra.