A teenager had to access a cinema through a fire exit and then be lifted out of his wheelchair by friends in order to watch a movie at a screen that was advertised as being wheelchair friendly. Thomas Mifsud, 15, said he was “frustrated and disappointed” that a night out with his friends “had to be so complicated”. His mother has filed a complaint with the Commissioner for the Rights of Persons with Disability. The cinema in St Julian’s, which had advertised the screen as wheelchair friendly when it opened in December, blamed delays in the order of a specially designed lift. But the teenager spoke out about the incident to highlight the lack of accessibility in most places in Malta, saying it “makes me more disabled than I actually am”. He said: “I value my independence just like everyone else my age… Every time I try to have a normal life, the lack of accessibility keeps on holding me back… I sit on a wheelchair, I am not invisible.” Before Thomas’s night out at the cinema last week, his mother, Nicolette Mifsud had contacted Eden Cinema to check which theatres were wheelchair accessible. The group of friends booked a movie in Cinema 8. “The movie was John Wick – we had wanted...
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