The Socio Economic Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities (SEEPD) Programme of the Cameroon Baptist Convention Health Services (CBCHS) is urging government and employers to expand job opportunities for young persons with disabilities, warning that exclusion from the labour market is denying Cameroon a significant pool of skills and talent.
The call comes as Cameroon joins the world to commemorate International Youth Day 2026 under the theme, “different contexts, common aspirations.”
Available estimates indicate that more than 80 per cent of persons with disabilities in Cameroon are unemployed, according to figures attributed to the Association for the Development of Entrepreneurship of Persons with Disabilities. The estimate covers more than one million persons of working age.
The situation is particularly concerning for young people entering a labour market already marked by widespread youth unemployment and underemployment.
SEEPD says its recent market analysis shows that young persons with disabilities participate in the labour market at significantly lower rates than their non disabled peers. The programme argues that the gap cannot simply be explained by a lack of education, skills or ambition.
“For thousands of young Cameroonians with disabilities, the greatest barrier to employment is not a lack of education, ambition or knowhow. It is the persistence of systems that continue to overlook talent because it presents differently,” said Awa Jacques Chirac, SEEPD Programme Manager.
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The wider employment environment makes the situation harder.
The statistics provided by SEEPD indicate that youth unemployment is above 30 per cent, while more than 60 per cent of employed graduates are severely underemployed, often working in areas unrelated to their training.
At the same time, more than 90 per cent of jobs in Cameroon are in the informal sector, where employment is generally less secure and offers fewer formal protections. The World Bank has previously described the labour market in Cameroon as being dominated by informal employment, with about 90 per cent of the workforce earning a living in that sector.
For young persons with disabilities, SEEPD says these structural weaknesses are compounded by discrimination, inaccessible workplaces and institutional barriers.
Research on livelihoods in Cameroon has also found that persons with disabilities were substantially less likely to have worked in the previous 12 months than persons without disabilities, even after differences in age, sex and education were considered.
Young women with disabilities face additional barriers linked to both disability and gender.
The problem is also worsened in conflict affected areas, particularly the Northwest and Southwest regions, where violence has disrupted businesses, livelihoods and access to education while creating new cases of disability.
Cameroon has legislation protecting and promoting the rights of persons with disabilities. But SEEPD says the greater challenge is translating those legal protections into actual opportunities.
“A right that cannot be accessed is a promise left unfulfilled,” Awa Jacques Chirac said.
The programme is therefore calling for stronger government coordination to ensure that public employment schemes, internships, vocational training and entrepreneurship programmes are accessible to young persons with disabilities.
It is also urging private employers to adopt fair recruitment practices and make workplaces accessible rather than treating disability as an automatic limitation on productivity.
SEEPD says civil society, organisations of persons with disabilities, academic institutions and development partners must equally expand pathways into skills development, entrepreneurship, digital inclusion and decent work.
The programme points to 23 year old Fopa Kuete Duclaire, whose technology, InReach, is designed to help people in the deaf community access digital content in real time, as an example of the innovation young persons with disabilities can bring to society.
SEEPD argues that inclusive employment is not only a disability rights issue. It is an economic opportunity.
Giving young persons with disabilities access to decent work can increase household incomes, strengthen independence, expand the pool of talent available to employers and allow more young Cameroonians to contribute to national development.
“Talent is not limited by disability. It is limited only when opportunity is denied,” the programme manager notes.
But SEEPD also highlights a major weakness in Cameroon’s response. Reliable, current and disaggregated statistics on the employment of young persons with disabilities remain scarce.
Without knowing how many young persons with disabilities are unemployed, where they live, what qualifications they possess and what sectors they could enter, policies risk being designed without sufficient evidence.
For SEEPD, International Youth Day should therefore move the conversation beyond celebration towards action.
“Our aspirations are common. Our opportunities must be too,” Awa Jacques Chirac says.
For a country seeking to harness the potential of its young population, the programme's message is straightforward: young persons with disabilities should not be treated as beneficiaries waiting for assistance, but as workers, entrepreneurs, innovators and contributors whose skills can strengthen Cameroon’s economy when the barriers to opportunity are removed.
By Bakah Derick for Hilltopvoices web
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