The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) has prescribed accessibility as a necessity in web page designing.
The desktop tools to validate accessibility are not readily available in Nigeria and the online versions are available to us only when we are online.

Should we continue to strive for accessibility in our designs or just go ahead to build sites as we possibly can?

Why should we care about what the W3C wants? Shouldn't we be more concerned about what our customers and site users want?

The customer is not always right, We have lost several jobs because we listened to the customer and sprayed the website with gratuitous flash, unneccesary graphics and needless javascript/dhtml effects, remember the swirly Swish text effects of years-long-gone?

So it was. after some smart compliant freelancer took one look at the site, did a make-over with sensibility and presented it to our client, he walked away with 3times the amoutn of money we charged and more business. we ended up looking like amateurs.

so stick with W3C-Compliant web designs

I have to agree with you.
The customer may have a desired design but it may not comply with professional standards.
We are not only to make money off the client but also to offer the best advice and service for the price and at the same time protect our image and integrity.

My advice on this topic is that you, as a previous poster has suggested, incorporate this into your design (together with SEO, etc) and add this to the price you quote your clients. Just like building a house, y not do it right the first time? By so doing, you look more professional as well as make a few more bucks

As for whether it is "to be" or "not to be", it depends on country/who your client is. In America, all government sites have to be 508-compliant. That's because their sites provide content for its citizens and of course, not all citizens are able to view a site without screen-readers, for instance.

In a country like Nigeria (which of course does its best to violate every natural law out there, but that's for another post ), I would dare say that with pple surfing mostly from cafes and with our attitude towards the disabled, there would be a lesser push towards compliance. Now, is that necessarily the correct thing to do (after all, getting a site 508-compliant isn't the easiest thing to do if not done right from the start)? I will let you make that call.

Just remember, as I have always said consistently here, sites though built for the Nigerian market, can potentially be visited by anyone anywhere in the world. You never know, through your good coding work, where you might end up

That's my 2 cents