Partners in Education: Issues and Trends from the 21st International Congress on the Education of the Deaf

Unique Challenges Related to the Education of Deaf and Hard of Hearing Individuals in Developing Countries: Examples from East Africa

89 Strand4:UniqueChallengesinDeveloping Countries UniqueChallengesRelatedto theEducationofDeafand Hardof HearingIndividuals inDevelopingCountries ExamplesfromEastAfrica Nassozi B. Kiyaga The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now! —African Proverb Developing countries are home to the world’s largest population of deaf and hard of hearing individuals, and each region presents unique challenges. Of the three regions that encompass the developing countries, sub-Saharan Africa lags behind Asia and Latin America as the least-developed and poorest area in the world despite possessing vast mineral wealth (Meredith, 2006). Although the African nations share common experiences, it is important to know the circumstances in which the education of deaf and hard of hearing individuals takes place. Background The United Nations Human Development Indices reveal that twenty-six of the world’s lowest-ranking countries in human development are African. Poverty affects more than half of Africa’s 880 million people, who are living on less than a US$1 a day, while life expectancy continues to decline due to 90 Nassozi Kiyaga the AIDS epidemic. Africa accounts for more than 70% of the world’s HIV cases, yet it is home to only 10% of the world’s population (Meredith, 2006). Sub-Saharan Africa is the only region in the world where school enrolment is falling. Illiteracy is common as two out of five Africans are illiterate, and half of Africa’s women are illiterate (by comparison, in East Asia and Latin America, only one in every eight adults cannot read or write). With the weakest infrastructure, most countries are unable to provide basic public services. Dysfunctional governments, many of which are extremely corrupt and characterized by widespread bad leadership, and failure to harness national resources for the welfare of their citizens, have resulted in the overwhelming deterioration of most public institutions. The plight of Deaf education in sub-Saharan Africa therefore reflects the inability of most African nations to establish and provide quality and meaningful education and points up the rampant bad governance, inequality, gross negligence and discrimination against children with hearing loss. Violent conflicts and political instabilities can rule out education for any child, but war-ravaged countries further marginalize children with hearing loss. Since 1966 eleven countries have been embroiled in civil wars, and four out of the ten countries known to be the least peaceful in the world are African, the most on any one continent (Moyo, 2009). War has devastating effects on human life, creates impoverishment, cripples development, destroys infrastructure, and has far-reaching consequences all around. For example, Uganda’s civil war in the north, which began in the early 1980s, lasted for more than two decades; ethnic violence that erupted in 1994 made Burundi the scene of one of Africa’s most destructive conflicts, jeopardizing its development and creating a debilitating decline in living standards. After the 1994 genocide, in which more than one million people were killed, Rwanda became the poorest country on earth. Natural disasters such as drought also put millions of people at risk and in urgent need of humanitarian assistance (BBC News, 2008). This keynote chapter focuses on East Africa (Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania), a region of great significance to the human race as the cradle of humankind. The challenges that we face in the education of individuals with hearing loss are similar to those in other developing regions. However, despite the challenges it is worth noting positive developments, albeit slow ones, that are a signal of hope on which we can build. Challenges Education of Deaf Individuals in Developing Countries 91 manifested through physiological and sociological phenomena present difficulties that have negative implications for children’s intellectual, psychological , and social development. Physiological Phenomena Hearing loss is predominately perceived as a pathological disorder that requires medical solutions, and millions of children suffer from illnesses that result in varying degrees of hearing loss. In fact, 80% of all cases of hearing loss are due to preventable diseases characterized by disease prevalence, acute shortage of health-care facilities, poverty, unhygienic living conditions, and the absence of appropriate public health infrastructures. Some of the diseases that may result in hearing loss are measles, meningitis, mumps, maternal rubella , and malaria, which is due to overdose or misuse of chloroquine and quinine. These ototoxic drugs continue to be widely administered to treat malaria, yet they damage the hearing organs. In Tanzania, these drugs are responsible for the large number...