After having been deserted by his wife and some other close
relatives, Paulo Mathias Sarwa alias ‘Kiboye’ who is infected with HIV/AIDS
disease lives in hardship and suffers the brunt of stigmatization. Being in
this situation, he hardly survives by help of well wishers. The 55 year old man
is a native of Tarime district who is residing at Gamasara village, Nyandoto
ward in Tarime Town Council, and has been living with the HIV virus since 2008
about six years now. The sad story of
Kiboye started when he came to discover he is infected by HIV virus after he
had underwent for the first time a voluntary testing of the HIV/AIDS disease in
2008 which was issued free of charge. The test was carried by Tarime district
health officials as part of the countrywide national campaign that aims to
combat the scourge. When the pre-testing of his blood was done and results came
out, he began to develop a psychological feeling and fear that took away his
normal mind into a distant scene. Since
then he had been living in great fear and rather in a somber mood and always could
be seen as somebody full of thoughts which seems to have taken him long time to
settle down. Older as he is, he is always
lamenting for what had made him to decide to undergo for a blood testing, whenever
he remembers the maltreatment he currently receives from his closer relatives
of being stigmatized. Despite of such positive feelings and humiliation which
are currently overcoming him, there is no way he could do to avoid the exercise.
When his body health began to
deteriorate his wife ran away from him and has never come back up to now to
look after him. He had been engaging himself in petty business activities and
now he is no longer able to move around to contend with such tedious activities
due to his body disorder. He is
currently facing hard time to get his daily bread, and hardly could he survive by
depending on well wishers who feel sympathy with him by offering whatever they
have to let him keep life going on. This is because of the fact that, he is not
physically fit enough to do any energetic activity such as farming that could
make him earn money with which to buy food and other necessities for his life. Reasons
for his physical unfitness has occurred due to the deteriorating body health
which to a greater extent has been caused due to lack of proper diet and worse
still has no one to help him around. He narrated this sad story to the writer
of this news when visited at his home compound which looks like a deserted homestead
consisting of two dilapidated huts in it. The writer of this news contacted him
after having come across his sad story which has become the talk of the day by
people in the entire village. What surprises most villagers is where the affected
HIV victim has been deserted by his beloved wife leaving him alone in the compound
without having anyone who could at least give him whatever help he could need as
a patient suffering from the deadly disease for that matter. He says, some people
volunteers to help draw some water for him in the morning and in the evening
from a nearby water stream known by many as ‘Bugura River’ from which most villagers draw water for domestic purposes.
The confluence of this river forms the boundary between Tarime district and the
newly established Rorya district. According to him, most of volunteers are teenagers
who carry with them water buckets down to the stream at such times and come
with water, while others help him collect firewood and prepare food for the
day. Narrating his life history, he says, he is born in a family of 9 children of
the late Sarwa Genge, three of whom are boys and the rest are girls who have
all been married. He is the only surviving son and his two brothers are already
dead whereas his both parents died long time ago when he was still schooling in
primary school. He was married to a woman called Wanchara Bikore of Bunchari
village in Sunsuni ward within Tarime district, who ran away from him and got
married to another man after he was discovered to have been infected by
HIV/AIDS disease. Since she ran away, he
has never bothered to follow her behind or demand his bride price back like most
African traditional customs demand, but resort to stay alone up to now. The possibility of getting a living has become
a great challenge for him indeed and this has been among the major aspect under
which he has been suffering, forget about the pangs of solitude caused as a
result of stigmatization the situation which has never redoubled up his mind
and become normal. In addition to that, what has been confusing him more is
whenever he remembers his two children whom he bore with his wife and who do
not even think of coming back to look after him, he narrated the story while in
a grief stricken mood as tears flowed down his chicks. Two years after his
test, in June 2010 he joined a group of 32 fellow victims who formed a small
group known by Kiswahili acronym “Jipe
Moyo Group” with a view to receive
the necessary assistance which the group provides to its members. According to
him the founding members of the group plus other members have died and now have
remained 17 only. However, he narrated that, the group is surviving with few
members because most people already affected by the disease are afraid to
expose their status for fear of being stigmatized. The group has been
registered in the district as a Community Based Organization (CBO) and operates
under the auspices of Tarime town council and members are entitled to receive
the necessary help including free medical services which according to him such
beneficiaries are in papers and never worked on. He said, their group rarely receives help from
the council, and whatever money is issued by the authorities is normally given
to the victims as loan which has to be refunded with a specified amount of
interest in it. But this has been an uphill task for him to afford for he
doesn’t have money.
The town council used to offer them food such as rice,
sugar, maize flours and other things to cater for their basic needs, but to the
great dismay they are surprised to see such supplies have been cut off without
prior notification two years ago, probably due to undisclosed financial
squeeze. He says, currently they greatly depend on individual help from well
wishers and donors in the district who donates on behalf of their organisation,
but such offers do not reach the targeted victims correctly and instead ends up
into pockets of the officials who look after the programme in the district. However,
he lamented they are sometimes experiencing lots of difficulties when chasing
for food aids from the district headquarter, an item which according to doctors
is essential for AIDS sufferers in order to keep active their CD4 cells in
their bodies. He queried the rationale
of their food distribution which he said is quite bad and not consistent,
therefore in view of this, he is appealing to the authorities concerned to
change the distribution and the trend of supplies so as to keep them full
sufficient with enough food stocks. “Such
services were normally allocated and issued on a monthly basis, but the
authorities concerned have since cancelled them forever and do not get them now”
he said and added that, due to the persisting situation, well wishers who seem
to be sympathetic with him comes for his rescue. For the medical treatment, he
noted that, they are faced with some difficulties of getting dosages on life
prolonging drugs the so-called ‘Antiretroviral’ (ARV) and malaria medicines
which they are entitled to free dosage, but these are not issued on time as
prescribed by doctors on monthly basis. He noted that, he has to trek on foot
for a distance of about 10 kilometers going and return to the district hospital
for medical services and sometimes come back with nothing. Commenting over the
issue, the Director of Tarime Town Council Venance Mwamengo said that, his
office has a policy that supports their staff already infected by the disease
and not outsiders. However, he couldn’t elaborate what special attention they
give to the registered group of people living with HIV in the district. He said
when contacted by telephone interview that, Tarime Town Council does not have a
budget for the HIV victims registered as CBOs as they get assistances from the AIDS
relief organizations through their representatives in the district. He refuted
allegations that, his council has failed to provide food and other basic
necessities to the people living with the HIV/AIDS disease in the district as such
services are not provided by his town council whatsoever. However, this writer
contacted Tarime District Commissioner (DC) John Henjewele by telephone and
said that his office does not coordinate with the people living with HIV in the
district, but promised to give the available statistics which he never issued
despite amid pressure by this writer to do so. As the real battle against HIV/AIDS disease among people in
Tanzania is being played out in families in both urban and in rural communities,
it has been discovered that the local government authorities rarely provides
special attention to the affected people in spite of global efforts to prevent
the scourge. According to Obadia Kasara,
a human right activist in the district, the increased high rates of
stigmatization shown to people living
with HIV virus is due to lack of proper education coupled by lack of voluntary
actions by some people who are not willing to give help to such victims. Describing
the nature of stigma, he says that, the rate at which discrimination against
AIDS sufferers is increasing in Tanzania now and then as many do not know what
their rights are and how they can help to change things for the better
attitude. On the other way round the authorities concerned might not be at
fault, but AIDS victims have to be blamed for keeping quiet and tend to conceal
their status once discovered themselves are already infected, probably due to
mistreatments most of whom fears to suffer for the rest of their life. He says,
the habit continues to pose a critical barrier to achieving universal access to
HIV related prevention, treatment care and support due to a number of reasons,
the most being unwillingness of the victims to expose themselves . When
contacted to elaborate on how the government
attends to HIV victims, the Communication and Documentation Officer for the
National Council of people living with HIV in the country (NACOPHA) Mensia John
said that, the organization has established about 136 levels of clusters known
as Konga at district levels throughout the country. She said through these
clusters, NACOPHA coordinates with members most of whom are people already
infected with HIV virus in a bid to educate them and put awareness on how to protect
them and get the necessary legal assistances. According to Chairman of the National
Council of people living with HIV virus, Vitalis Makayula the rate of HIV/AIDS
infections among married couples is higher compared to singles. He says the infection
rate keeps on rising in Tanzania due to negligence y some couples to follow the
directives issued as precautions to be taken against infections. Makuyula was
recently quoted by the media as saying that, the worrying situations on various
reasons such as change in lifestyle, multiple partners, and lack of
negotiations for safer sex is essential to married couples. He suggests on comprehensive on education for
married couples on preventive measures on HIV/AIDS and review of policies on
the same, which he described as hostile with a view of coming up with a package
of new messages that will be friendly and convincing to attract them go for
voluntary counseling and testing. Research is urgently needed to identify the
most effective ways of tackling stigma and discrimination across a range of
contexts. With respect to measures to counter discrimination a more
programmatic approach has to be adopted. A Dar based private lawyer Samson Mwambi
suggests on the possible way to end the increased stigmatization habit that, unless
the government enacts a legislation that would restrict defaulters who are fond
of such malpractice of discriminating people living with HIV/AIDS disease.
He further noted that, the legislation should also bind
married couples who run away from their partners so as to let them continue looking
after the welfare of the already infected partner from being subjected to
torture under discrimination. NACOPHA is the umbrella organization comprised of
networks of people living with HIV operating countrywide. The National networks
are also comprised of registered NGOs and organized groups of people living
with HIV at different levels. NACOPHA has a secretariat comprising of
both highly skilled technical and administrative staff who coordinate and
manage resources received from donors to support implementation of the various
program activities. The secretariat staff is headed by the Chief
Executive officer who oversees and provides strategic and management leadership
and is accountable for managing the organization funds as well.
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