In the media, we have recently been told by the prime minister of the launching of the Iskandar Development Region, the Northern Corridor Economic Region, the East Coast Economic Region with similar corridors being planned for Sabah and Sarawak. These have been greeted with great excitement.

The PM has been quoted as saying, 'There is excitement when they hear we are going to bring development to these corridor areas'.

One can only but speculate who the 'they' are who have expressed excitement but it is certainly not the disabled, the elderly, families with babies and children or the infirm or pregnant since these sections of the 'rakyat' have been, and will no doubt continue to be marginalised, discriminated against, if not entirely ignored.

All new transportation systems for these corridor projects, such as the soon-to-be awarded Penang monorail project and other new monorail and LRT systems being proposed for Kuala Lumpur, Petaling Jaya, Putrajaya and Johor Bahru, as well as all buses, trains and other forms of transport must be, without exception, universally designed so as to make them accessible to all.

Even if these 'economic region' projects are supposed to create many new job opportunities for the people such as in tourism, agriculture and small and medium industries, these job opportunities will not be available to those who are excluded from travelling because of a public transport infrastructure that is inaccessible to them.

The disabled, the elderly and others who have mobility difficulties must be included in every aspect of life, and until that time, they are certainly not at all 'excited' about being excluded.

The writer is secretary, Support Group Society for the Blind of Malaysia.