By Kenneth Okonkwo
I attended one high profile birthday celebration in Abuja sometime ago. In that celebration, some physically challenged persons were invited too. I picked interest in one pretty lady among them. My attention was drawn to her when one young guy wanted to chat her up but she wasn’t replying.
When the guy noticed that she was using sign language, the guy apologised to her and their leader and confessed to the leader that he didn’t know that she was deaf and dumb. The young girl was mad when she perceived what the young guy told their leader. She quipped, the mere fact that I am deaf, doesn’t imply that I am dumb. It dawned on me that if you call a person dumb, it doesn’t necessarily mean that the person is temporarily unable or unwilling to speak, it means the person is showing a lack of intelligence.
