Less than 0.5% of published works are available in accessible formats like braille, and the majority are published by non-profit organisations, like Blind SA - meaning that the blind and visually impaired in South Africa are currently suffering a book famine. 

The dark irony is that this suffering is currently being created by the South African government who have dragged their feet, despite a Constitutional Court order, to ratify an international treaty which would make the production and international transfer of specially-adapted books for people who are blind or visually impaired easier! The government initially blamed its refusal to ratify the Marrakesh Treaty (“Treaty”) on South Africa’s copyright laws, which prohibited books from being published in braille, or other formats accessible to persons who are visually impaired, without the author or publisher’s permission. In September 2022, the Constitutional Court handed down judgment providing an exception to that provision in the Copyright Act - meaning that the government was free to ratify the Treaty. 

It has been almost a year since the Constitutional Court judgment, and still the South African government has shown no sign of moving towards ratification, thereby CHOOSING to leave persons who are blind and visually impaired in South Africa in the dark (in more ways than one).

Enough is enough! We have done all that we can from a legal perspective to push the government to do right by persons who are blind and visually impaired in South Africa, so now is the time to show the government the might of people power by demanding that it signs and ratifies the Marrakesh Treaty, and finally gives persons who are blind and visually impaired in South Africa braille and other books in accessible formats! #EndTheBookFamine #SignTheMarrakeshTreatyNow #10YearsTooLate

Please sign and share this petition to help us demand what is owed to a consistently marginalised group of South African society. 

This petition will be handed over to the Department of Trade, Industry and Competition, the Department of Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities, the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development, the Presidency and the Department of International Relations and Cooperation in Pretoria on 27 June 2023 - on the 10th anniversary of the adoption of the Marrakesh Treaty in Morocco.