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The New Generation of Disability Leaders - Alicia Contreras & Mohammed Loutfy
Alicia Contreras | Mohammed Loutfy, second from left
Many Disability Rights Movement (DRM) activists have said since the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) in 1990, that the next generation has yet to step up and lead the DRM. Alicia Contreras and Mohammed Loutfy prove that not only has a new leadership generation emerged, but that traditional boundaries of the movement are being breeched. These two dynamic individuals show that disability discrimination and oppression are a human rights issue that touches all corners of the globe and requires a united front including all people of the world.
Alicia Contreras
While there has not been an outbreak of Polio in over 20 years in the United States, many countries throughout the world have yet to completely eradicate the disease. During the last week of September 2004, the World Health Organization recorded 717 new cases of Polio globally. At just under two years of age, Alicia Contreras contracted Polio. Born and raised in Mexico City, Alicia challenged society's rules and proved that a determined woman can change the world.
Despite her humility and claims that she has merely “been in the right place at the right times”, Alicia’s life is full of amazing examples of how her courage and tenacity have ensured that she has shaped the lives of women with disabilities and has not allowed borders to restrict her impact on the world.
When Alicia was 26, she joined Libre Acceso or Free Access and began formulating her disability identity along with a group of fellow disabled professionals in Mexico City. They invited some of the top government officials to their breakfast and soon were instrumental in changing laws pertaining to individuals with disabilities in Mexico. Due to one crucial contact in the government, Alicia was asked to introduce a proposal that would ensure that all children- disabled and non-disabled alike- would receive a free education at a major human rights meeting. It was at this meeting that a man from Mobility International recognized that great potential existed in Alicia.
After taking part in a leadership-training program sponsored by Mobility International in Eugene, Oregon, Alicia chose to return to Mexico and started Cevimudi an organization of disabled women in San Luis Potosi, Mexico. This led to her appointment by the city government to start the first project in support of people with disabilities.
Her sharp wit and infectious personality no doubt are keys to her success in advocacy work with women with disabilities. Beginning as Program Director in 2000 for the organization that was then known as Whirlwind Women International, she recently became Executive Director in April 2004. The advent of her reign also marked a major shift in the organization, when Whirlwind Women changed its name and became known as Women Pushing Forward: The Power of Mobility (WPF). WPF has conducted work in Mexico, Uganda, Thailand, Kenya, and Columbia enabling women with mobility impairments discover and learn to build their own wheelchairs and other mobility enhancing devices. Yet, their work includes much more. They teach women about Independent Living skills empowering them to aspire to more than the low expectations that people all over the world have for women with disabilities.
Alicia and the women at WPF have helped change the lives of women with disabilities in areas of the world where hope and prosperity are precious commodities. Alicia Contreras is striving to create her own path in the world and helping women with disabilities throughout the world do the same.
Mohammed Loutfy
Born and raised in Beirut, Lebanon, Mohammed has been blind since he was seven years old. His perceptive intelligence and resolute spirit have taken him far in just 27 years. After attending a special school for the blind for seven years, he went on to attend a mainstream high school, received a diploma and a law degree in Lebanon.
While attending University, Mohammed became extremely active in advancing the right of blind people in Lebanon, with a particular focus on youth advocacy and leadership. He began volunteering with the Youth Association of the Blind conducting advocacy campaigns and workshops targeting both disabled and non-disabled people.
In September 2003, Mohammed participated in the Youth, Development & Peace Conference in Paris, sponsored by the World Bank. The World Bank works to bridge the divide between developed and developing nations and turn rich country resources into poor country growth. One of the world’s largest sources of development assistance, the World Bank supports the efforts of developing country governments to build schools and health centers, provide water and electricity, fight disease, and protect the environment. It was at that conference that Mohammed learned that a position was opening at the World Bank for a junior professional associate in the Disability and Development Unit.
Soon, Mohammed found himself on his way to Washington DC working with Judy Heumann, one of the first leaders of the Disability Rights Movement, co-founder of the World Institute on Disability, and appointee of the Clinton Administration as Assistant Secretary for the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services in the U.S. Department of Education until 2001.
His position at the World Bank is designed to serve youth across all six regions that are served by the Bank. In just six short months, he has taken part in seminars and videoconferences such as Poverty Reduction in Shanghai and Youth, Development & Peace Conference in Sarajevo. Mohammed’s involvement in the Youth to Youth Initiative challenges him and other young staff members at the Bank to empower and to increase the engagement opportunities for all youth to participate in the decision-making process for local development projects.
While Mohammed has only been in the Unite States for a short time, he has made assessments about the disability community that many born here fail to observe. He believes that while Americans are more aware about Disability Rights than many other parts of the world, he deftly identified main impediments to advancing the rights of people with disabilities in this country. He feels that specific disability groups and related organizations still spend far too much of their time, energy, and resources bickering amongst one another and that the competition between organizations continues to undermine progress that is essential to reducing the very real oppression that we all are ultimately trying to eliminate.
Both Alicia and Mohammed demonstrate that the next generation of disability advocates have arrived with an International human rights perspective on disability issues. Disability touches the lives of people in all areas of the world, in all ethnic groups and cultures, and most notably, predominate the poorest of the poor all over the globe. Advocates with disabilities and our non-disabled allies can all benefit by following the examples set by Alicia and Mohammed.