ABSTRACT
The advocacy for post-secondary educational inclusion of disabled people in southern Africa abounds with disability rights conventions, declarations and policies. Yet in southern Africa, disability rights and discourses are as marginal in the public sphere as they are in the support provision for disabled students in higher education. A review of national and institutional policies and legislations reveals variations and unevenness in availability and scope. These variations mask the pervasive ignorance and disregard of the rights of disabled people. The uneven support for disabled students is rationalised in the voluntarist language of accessibility, affordability and advocacy. This chapter argues that voluntarism individualises disability and undermines the opportunity to advance national disability rights and fails to make disability support a commonplace at institutional levels.
