Volunteers’ eyes opened at 2025 Wheelchair Wednesday roll-out

SPAR EC employees Fredalene Scheepers and Veneto Slinger gain a new appreciation of the challenges persons with disabilities experience when shopping.

No time was wasted in opening people’s eyes to the daily difficulties persons with disabilities face when this year’s Wheelchair Wednesday campaign was launched on Mandela Day.

Held at title-sponsor SPAR Eastern Cape’s provincial distribution centre in Gqeberha on July 18, a group of employees working at the facility volunteered to spend 67 minutes in a wheelchair.

The staffers’ legs were strapped to the bottom of the devices and, with the help of colleagues who acted as “pushers”, were asked to complete a series of tasks around the property.

These ranged from entering and exiting the on-site store to operating their computers.

To challenge the pairs further, the aids were made to wear special simulation glasses loaned by the Nkosinathi Foundation, an NGO that works within the blind and partially-sighted in the Eastern Cape.

The eyewear hinders sight, serving to create awareness about the needs of the visually-impaired.

Wheelchair Wednesday, which runs from the end of August to the beginning of November, is the largest annual fundraising campaign for the Nelson Mandela Bay chapter of the Association for the Physically Disabled (APD).

The initiative has been supported by SPAR EC for 13 of its 14 years.

In that time 2 400 wheelchairs have been donated to beneficiaries through corporates opening their hearts and wallets at activation events held at various stores in Nelson Mandela Bay and surrounds.

The launch was attended by persons with disabilities, their families, members of the APD executive, provincial and district representatives from the department of social development as well as those from partners Atlas Security and ECMR.

APD social worker Sanele Nkentsha also demonstrated to the audience the correct use of a wheelchair and how users and their families can prevent pain and sores from occurring.

The occasion was further marked by a rousing performance by the APD choir.

SPAR advertising manager Roseann Shadrach recalled the first time she took part in one of the activations.

“I was consumed by anxiety. I suddenly knew what it felt like to be a differently-abled person,” she said.

“I refer to these members of our community as differently-abled because there is a future for them. They just work through life very differently.”

It was a sentiment also expressed by Yonwaba Ntsabo, chairperson of the Eastern Cape Disability Forum, who said the word “disability” did not define the person living with one.

It is only the surroundings that causes people to be seen as disabled.

“If we create enabling environments, they wouldn’t be referred to in this way,” Ntsabo said.

He explained that they supported “this wonderful initiative” as it was “better to do a small thing in a great way than a great thing in a small way”.

Alan Stapleton, who retired from SPAR EC last year but is still involved with the campaign, said the joy of seeing someone receiving a new wheelchair was unmatched.

It could take up to three years for a candidate to receive a device if they went through normal channels, he pointed out.

“So far in excess of 2 000 people have been freed from sitting in their houses or rooms to become part of life, work and become useful in their homes,” he said.

“In 14 years between 8 000 to 10 000 people have seen what life is like in a wheelchair through our activations. It is a huge deal,” he said.

Stapleton paid tribute to the APD executive for their outstanding work over the years.

Moeti Mphuthing, deputy director of services to persons with disabilities at the provincial department of social development, said Wheelchair Wednesday appealed directly to the department’s mandate to ensure vulnerable groups were protected and cared for.