Civil society vital in creating HIV/AIDS awareness

It is important that civil society is involved in assisting the country's HIV/AIDS awareness and advocacy activities, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Resident Representative, Ms. Scholastica Kimaryo has said.

Addressing a three-day workshop on Leadership for Transformational Change held at the Maseru Sun hotel on January 20, Ms. Kimaryo said civic society played an important role in encouraging Basotho to participate in the 2002 general elections and in the same way convince Basotho that the virus needs to be stopped from spreading.

The UN system in Lesotho is committed to assist government in implementing activities that aim at eradicating HIV/AIDS in the country, the Resident Representative said, announcing that UNAIDS will help in the formation of district HIV/AIDS commissions as well as assist the Lesotho AIDS Programme Coordinating Authority (LAPCA) implement its  programmes.

The district commissions will be made up of five representatives each, including a person living with AIDS, a youth, a female member, church and civil society representatives. They will be mandated to mobilise  communities to scale up their effort against HIV/AIDS. Each member of the commission will mobilize
his or her peers in the district and together join forces in the battle to eradicate the pandemic, Ms. Kimaryo said.

The commissions will also work government to ensure that the latter's plans at the district level are implemented.

"This workshop is part of the process to empower people at the district level to be able to mobilise the community to change their perceptions towards HIV/AIDS and the expectation is that by the end of June, 2004 all Basotho should be tested and know their HIV status," she said.

Speaking at the same occasion, the Director of Human Resources in the Ministry of Local Government Mrs. 'Malitlallo Majara said the workshop was part of the national response to scale-down HIV/AIDS by involving all individuals from chiefs, district secretaries, non-government organizations, government ministries and individuals in the battle against AIDS.

"In this process, the first phase will be to transform people's perceptions in relation to HIV/AIDS and the second phase is to empower them with knowledge in order to achieve HIV/AIDS competence in relation to information related to the disease so that they can be able to advocate for universal HIV testing," she said.

Mrs. Majara said the HIV testing will enable the government to determine the number of HIV infected people in the country and those that are negative, and that the data will assist government in planning the well being of the Basotho nation by ensuring those that are negative stay that way and the positive receive the necessary support to live longer.

20 January 2004