BOTSWANA COUNCIL FOR THE DISABLED

WORLD BRAILLE DAY
2024-01-04
World Braille Day on January 4 is celebrated to honour the birth of Braille’s inventor, Louis Braille. Braille’s gift to the world has brightened the lives of millions of people around the world who are blind or visually impaired, and they benefit from his work every day. The day also acknowledges that those with visual impairments deserve the same standard of human rights as everyone else.
History of World Braille Day
The term ‘Braille ‘was dabbed after its creator, Louis Braille was a French man who lost his eyesight as a child when he accidently stabbed himself in the eye with his father’s awl. From the age of 10 he spent time at the Royal Institute for Blind Youth in France, where he formulated and perfected the system of raised dots that eventually became known as Braille.
Braille completed his work, developing a code based on six dots, making it possible for a fingertip to feel the entire cell unit with one touch and moving quickly from one cell to the next. Eventually, Braille slowly came to be accepted throughout the world as the main form of written information for Blind people. Unfortunately, Braille didn’t have the opportunity to see how useful his invention had become. He passed away in 1852, two years before the Royal Institute began teaching Braille.
Braille’s marvellous aid that opened up a world accessibility to the blind and visually impaired was recognized by the United Nations general Assembly (UNGA). In November 2018, January 4th was declared World Braile Day. The first-ever World Braille Day was commemorated the following year and it was celebrated as an international holiday.

WHITE CANE SAFETY DAY
2024-11-15 06:30 - 14:00 UTC | Molepolole, Kgosing Kgotla, Molepolole, Botswana

BIDII-YETU 2026 BOTSWANA INCLUSIVE CYCLING CHALLENGE – 1000KM
2026-10-24 - 2026-11-07 | Gaborone to Kasane, Ga
In 2023, a group of five cyclists rode over 2400 kilometers (1500 miles) from the Atlantic Ocean in Namibia to the Indian Ocean in Mozambique. Two of the cyclists were paraplegic and used hand cycles, a first-ever adaptive cycling journey across these five countries. The endeavor would not have been possible without the two support vans and hundreds of local cyclists along the way. The Botswana Council for the Disabled (BCD) rode all 700 kilometers across Botswana with the team.
Buoyed by this initial success, Bidii Yetu will now serve as a catalyst for African organizations that wish to promote inclusive cycling events and raise further awareness of the enormous unrealized potential of persons with disabilities. This year, Bidii Yetu and the BCD are co-organizing a ride to demonstrate the power of cycling events that include both disabled and two-wheel cyclists. Our event will be a 1000 kilometer (600+ mile) ride from 24 October – 7 November 2026. It will start in Gaborone, Botswana’s capital in its south, and end at its northern border with Zambia. The route will have us stopping in villages and towns to spread the word about how adaptive sports benefit everyone, not just persons with disabilities, and to advocate for greater inclusion of the disabled in everyday sports and recreation.
This two-week odyssey presents a different challenge from the Bidii Yetu 2023 ride from Namibia to Mozambique. We will be taking a larger group, requiring extra organisation and support crew. We will use this experience to develop a model for disabled persons’ organizations and cycling clubs across Africa who might be interested in undertaking future, similar inclusive cycling events.
Are you a cyclist? We are looking for 50-100 cyclists of all types, both from the African continent and further afield, who want to experience the beauty of Botswana by bike, and the power of cooperation between two-wheel and hand cyclists.
Official website: https://botswana.bidiiyetu-nolimits.org/
