Born with deformed limbs, she pushed for disabled access in Singapore to help those with disabilities

Finally, Wee landed her first task at Singtel, answering smartphone sales enquiries. It was 1980, and she was 19.

She worked there for three centuries before retiring. Along the way, she received a scholarship to complete her primary education, graduating from Ngee Ann Polytechnic with a system studies diploma. &nbsp,

” I often appeal to businesses, when they have a guy with a disability applying for a job, give them their initial job, because they need the knowledge.

” They need to understand what it’s like. Nothing compares having wealth and being financially independent. When they learn to do stuff by themselves, it builds trust. Without a job, their families will permanently treat them like kids.”

ADVOCATING FOR Illness Exposure

Wee was determined to turn the status quo on its nose due to his dissatisfaction with the shortcomings of the built setting.

Her commitment was strengthened after attending a seminar in Vancouver, Canada, in the first ‘ 90s. She went there and saw firsthand how wheelchair-bound folks moved on with such convenience.

She and a few of the board members of the Handicaps Welfare Association ( HWA ) wrote letters to various ministries all over the world asking for their building codes and environmental accessibility guidelines after that. We decided that it was time to consider how to make Singapore visible.

Every weekend, she and her HWA friends walked the streets to examine and identify areas where accessibility may be improved.

After gathering enough evidence to support their case, they began discussions with the Building and Construction Authority (BCA ) and the Public Works Department ( PWD ). &nbsp,

Their discussions bore fruit in the form of the 1995 Barrier-Free Accessibility (BFA) Code. All buildings built after 1995 had to comply with the code.