Ten-day disability rights campaign at Casablanca international book fair, more than 25,000 visited us and exchange with us on disability rights
More than 25 000 visited our exhibition stall this year at the Casablanca International Publishing and Book Fair 2016, better known in French as the Salon International de l'Edition et du Livre (SIEL), held from February 12 to 21, 2016.
All activities at our 360 m² stall revolved around disability rights and issues. Over ten days, the Stall hosted more than sixty activities. These activities were led by some 260 national and international experts and stakeholders, from 25 countries (Australia, Benin, Brazil, Bulgaria, Egypt, El Salvador, France, Gabon, Ghana, Iraq, Italy, Jordan, Kenya, Libya, Mexico, Morocco, Niger, Palestine, Portugal, Rwanda, Senegal, Tunisia, Turkey, UK, and the United States of America). The activities included training sessions, roundtable discussions, and awareness-raising workshops and activities for children, civil society stakeholders, and passers-by.
The CNDH gave tributes at the book fair to 16 Moroccan Special Olympic and Paralympic athletes and champions (tennis, badminton and athletics).
The CNDH’s thirteen regional human rights commissions mobilized about one hundred disability rights organizations, including regional networks, local associations and associations of families from all over Morocco to take part in or lead meetings and activities at the stall.
The Council also held an international meeting at the book fair on disability rights protection mechanisms, inviting experts and representatives of several national human rights institutions. The participants of this meeting shared good practices and exchanged, particularly on the experiences of NHRIs in Senegal, Ghana, Mexico, Gabon and Jordan.
On the sidelines of this ten-day campaign, the Council's regional human rights commission of Rabat and HandiFilm Association held the 10th Cinema and Disability Festival “My dignity, my right”, from 30 March to 2 April 2016 in Rabat. The tenth edition featured an international competition of short movies on disability, an awareness-raising podcast competition, a roundtable discussion on disability in Moroccan cinema, a scenario writing workshop, and a lecture on the right to dignity and how this right can affect the lives of people with disabilities.
The CNDH had launched a national competition for young Moroccan architects to design an accessible exhibition stall at the 22nd Casablanca International Publishing and Book Fair. The stall won the first Accessibility Award, awarded by the Ministry of Solidarity, Women, Family and Social Development and the Ministry of Culture.