Source document: https://docs-lawep.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/1697750923523.pdf (Ireland)
Eliona Gjecaj Disability Matters Committee 9 March 2023 at 9:30 I would like to start by thanking the committee for inviting me here.

My name is Eliona Gjecaj, am a disability activist and researcher of access to justice for disabled women from Galway.

I am a white woman, have black hair, and am waring a *** top.
Self-advocacy for me started when I acquired visual impairment, and has continued to this day in different aspects of my life such as education, support services, and participation with local and national NGOs.

During my undergrad degree in NUI Galway I found and co-set up a student society called IMPACTE (Inclusion and Participation to Access Community Transformation and Engagement) for students with disability.

It was a space for self-advocacy as individuals and as a collective.
This led to participation of members into an accessible student life, support for one another, and transformative actions such as a student referendum to establish a disability officer within the Student Union in NUI Galway, among many other actions.

My point here is not to list what IMPACTE society, and I have achieved, but rather to highlight that self-advocacy leads to participation, and participation leads to self-advocacy.
Self-advocacy, whether individual or as part of a collective, is our voice as citizens, as subjects of human rights, and as customers and consumers.

Participation on the other hand is inclusion, not integration.

It is the CRPD’s general obligation on states to enable, ensure, and provide accessible platforms for us as disabled people, disabled women to have our self-advocacy, our voice spoken, heard, listen to, and transformed into actions, inclusive practice, policy and law.
Every article of CRPD is interlinked with others, and when we combine self-advocacy and participation, we are to apply that to every article within the convention, within every aspect of our lives as disabled people, disabled women, for example regarding education, health, support services, access to justice, freedom from violence and so on.
In light of the International Women’s Day, I would like to close my speech by celebrating all the disabled women of Ireland for coming forward, disclosing, speaking up and speaking about gender-based violence against US.

Thank you for being strong, for sharing your experience, for empowering others to come forward and for initiating a conversation.

Violence does not discriminate, and as research shows, disabled women are at higher risk of experiencing violence than non-disabled women.
Violence is not taboo; we must continue to self/advocate as individuals and collective.

We must be enabled to participate in inclusive accessible ways, so, that together we can walk the justice walk, and as a society we can build an inclusive future, free from violence.

Thank you!