On Wednesday, 19th March 2025 members of the IFA team led by the Executive Director, Ms. Grace Jerry, paid an advocacy visit to the Executive Secretary of the National Commission for Persons with Disabilities, Barr Ayuba Gufwan.

The meeting kicked off with the introduction of the IFA team to the Executive Secretary (ES) while ED Grace Jerry went on to extend her gratitude to the commission for her strong partnership with IFA.

She went further to state the main purpose for the visit, and in light of this, Festus went on to deliver a presentation of the accessibility compliance dashboard to the ES which he stated was in line with the disability act and how we are committed to demanding accountability.

To buttress on the presentation, IFA Director of Programs Molly Joshua stated that the innovation came about as an effort to support the work of the commission in enforcing the disability act.

ED Grace Jerry further emphasized that it will be instrumental when the issuance of the disability compliance certificate commences, as the status of all stakeholders will be updated on the dashboard.

The ES in response to the presentation, welcomed IFA team and stated there were about 35.5 million PWDs in Nigeria, which is a very huge and scary number, and unfortunately, they happen to be left behind.

According to him, to bridge the gap, so much needed to be done, and he is here and willing to make a difference; however, he needs our support to move the disability community forward.

He appreciated the good work IFA is doing and stated we will continue to synergize and work together.

ED notified the ES of the organizational inclusion training coming up, for which an invite has been sent to the commission. She also notified him of the dashboard validation that was upcoming while requesting that the ES grant his permission for the conference room of the commission to be used as the venue for the validation.