Panafrican News Agency - December 6, 2001
Opening a Labour Ministry national seminar on combating HIV/AIDS at the workplace, Mocumbi urged the meeting to activate all possible means to counter the spread of the disease and its negative effects.
Describing the workforce as a great tool in the struggle against HIV/AIDS, he called on the participants to commit themselves to building an activists' network in workplaces and residential areas.
"We must identify how each company or sector of activity can guarantee that no worker is infected with HIV", he said.
The seminar comes just two weeks after the first reading in parliament of a bill seeking to protect workers living with HIV/AIDS, the Mozambique news agency, AIM, reported.
Mocumbi said the bill should not be used as an instrument of prompting workers to shun the struggle against the disease.
"It's a bill that should encourage those who, even though they live with AIDS, still don't understand it well, and fear to break the silence - which makes it difficult to transmit prevention messages", he said.
Mocumbi added that a message conveyed by an HIV-positive person "is stronger than a message conveyed, for example, by politicians".
The bill is intended to encourage HIV-positive persons to speak up and support education and information campaigns on the disease, enabling them to avoid exclusion from the country's socio-economic life.
Mocumbi urged everyone to remain vigilant until such a day that society acquires new habits to show affection based on faithfulness to one partner, and on the practice of safe sex.
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