Inter Press Service - September 23, 2003
Joyce Mulama

Through the tear-jerking and thought-provoking poem, the children, from Nyumbani Children's Home, ask for a friend to lend a helping hand in the fight against the epidemic.

The friend, at this particular time, happens to be the Organisation of African First Ladies Against AIDS (OAFLA), represented by Kenya's Lucy Kibaki and Rwanda's Jeanette Kagame, as well as Janet Museveni of Uganda and Harriette Conte of Guinea.

The First Ladies have come to Kenya to launch the organisation's monitoring, advocacy and stigma reduction campaigns.

Official statistics say about 29 million of the 40 million people living with HIV/AIDS worldwide are from sub-Saharan Africa. About 58 percent of those infected are women.

The initiative, which is backed by Action Aid and Support for International Partnership Against AIDS in Africa (SIPAA), seeks to sensitise African governments to campaign and mobilise resources towards fighting the pandemic from all fronts.

"This initiative is also a major milestone in our common confrontation with AIDS," notes Kibaki.

"With this regional resolve and determination by women in Africa, and with the support of our respective governments and development partners, we will be able to provide efficient and concrete strategies that help us to sustain our aspirations and efforts in the fight against HIV/AIDS," she asserts.

Women living with HIV/AIDS have lauded the initiative, saying it is a sign that HIV/AIDS is everyone's concern.

To reduce the spread of the disease, the women have appealed to the First Ladies for help. "Do not leave us out, work together with us because it is the person who wears shoe who knows where it pinches most," says Dorothy Onyango of the International Community of Women Living with HIV (ICW). At an OAFLA satellite conference on Sep 20, the First Ladies emphasised that women must be in the forefront in the struggle against the pandemic, since they are the ones who are adversely affected by the disease.

"We, as women, are the ones who have first hand experience in dealing with the scourge, having experienced it while providing support and care for our husbands, children and relatives dying with HIV/AIDS. We, therefore, must take the bull by the horn," observed Kibaki.

Commentators have often contended that First Ladies have the capacity to reverse the HIV/AIDS trend since they have access to key decision makers in their countries.

Kagame says, "As first ladies we cannot stand by passively as AIDS destroys families and wipes out whole sections of our society. It is our duty to act without delay."

The OAFLA conference is being held alongside the International Conference on AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Infections in Africa (ICASA), which opened in Nairobi on Monday. Further commitment to combating the disease, which has devastated the continent, had been exhibited on Sep 20, when more than 12,000 women, led by Kibaki took part in a landmark race, to boost awareness on the HIV/AIDS scourge.

The race, dubbed "First International Women's AIDS Run", was organised to raise funds to support women who take care of the millions of AIDS orphans in Africa.

Statistics indicate that an estimated 12 million children in Africa have been orphaned by the disease. According to a joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS, the number is likely to rise to at least 25 million by 2010.

The 10 km race also sought to commemorate the "extraordinary strength, spirit and determination that African women and girls bring to the struggle against AIDS". (END/2003)
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