The COVID-19 pandemic has affected several people badly in so many ways but that of Seth Kwame Ajimi a.k.a Skanjimi seems more terrible as he has to struggle as a blind person and a drinking spot owner.

Unless there is a divine intervention, the 59-year-old man would continue to wallow in financial difficulty. In an interview with The Spectator, he described his situation in this COVID-19 era as “terrible.”

Mr. Ajimi who became blind 11 years ago as a result of a domestic accident said that going through life as a physically challenged had been compounded by the coronavirus pandemic.

He explained that before now, “blind people could conveniently touch surfaces and people to help them with their movement but the outbreak of the deadly disease has put them at the disadvantage.”

“Now we are told to avoid touching surfaces and also practise social distancing so you understand me when I say life has not been easy,” he explained.

The Operator of the Skanjimi Spot located in the Kpone Katamanso Municipality of the Greater Accra Region said that his business which entailed  the sale of food and drinks was affected when a railway line was constructed around his spot but he was managing to survive until March last year when there was the COVID-19 and subsequently a lockdown and this had put him in an awkward situation.

“That was when I fell flat on the floor. I had to send some of my workers away and run the place with the help of a boy who helps me with my movement and one staff,” he lamented.

He said persons who operated bars, spots, pubs among other related businesses had been ordered not to run full time but nothing or little had been done to support people like him.

The visually impaired said that people hardly patronised his spot these days yet he had to “squeeze” to pay his bills and provide hygiene materials to keep his place safe from the coronavirus in order to protect himself and his customers.

He said that he had been trying to put up a chamber and hall building when business was good but it had stalled because he could hardly raise money from his business to continue the project.

Mr. Ajimi said he feared his current landlord may be compelled to eject him for his inability to promptly pay rent and called on the public to support him in both cash and kind to survive, hoping to come out of the wood since “the downfall of a man is not the end of his life”.

From Dzifa Tetteh, Kpone