Papua New Guinea is in need of sign language interpreters to assist hearing impaired citizens.
Sign language educator Rose Launch said the challenge for many hearing impaired people is that their rights are denied due to limited number of interpreters.
Launch teaches at the Red Cross Special Education Resource Centre stressing that the interpreters in the country are mostly teachers.
“When we have time to give them service, we do but if we don’t then they’re denied from their rights but we try our best to give them service.
“I appeal to government departments to look into your policy to include people with special needs into the policies.”
Recently, two workshops for sign language interpreters’ funded by the Pacific Disability Forum were held in Port Moresby and Madang where two facilitators from Fiji attended.
Launch said the facilitators shared their experiences and gave tips on how best they can interpret for the deaf community.
She added that at the end of the workshops, there was a demand to have more training and more workshops for interpreters which is lacking in PNG.