From the American People .....

There's nothing like posing with a little black baby for a bit of goodwill ... and George's PR machine picked a great one yesterday for the big announcement that PEPFAR (President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief) would be extended for another 5 years .... and the amount pledged was doubled to 30 billion dollars ....

Wow.

Apparently Laura Bush is coming to Africa next month to promote this extension of the initiative ... her favourite organisation here is the Mothers to Mothers to Be Programme (predictably - no condom education needed in this one or that would complicate matters).

As President Bush said:
“She and I share a passion .... We believe that to whom much is given, much is required.”

The current PEPFAR (2003-2007) pledged 15 billion dollars over 5 years (now closer to 18 billion) .... and aimed to put 2 million people on treatment ... in all honesty today the number of people supported on ARVs through PEPFAR is probably closer to 1 million ... but most controversially the programme has taught 61.5 million people on abstinence ....

Now don't get me wrong - this renewal of PEPFAR is truly a great and wonderful thing ... especially for an administration whose frugality in terms of development aid has contrasted massively with its spending on defence .... and also it doesn't take a cynical mind to see this is a fabulous distraction from a dismal record on climate change, iraq, human rights etc etc .... and that the whole programme has played very nicely to extend the legacy of the Christian Right ....

However there is no doubt that through this extra funding lives will be saved and that new infections averted .... additionally PEPFAR certainly has bipartisan support ... and it is a relief that George has ensured that the funding will be committed well into the next government ......

Even better - this announcement throws down the gauntlet for the next week's G8 summit ... especially to the Germans and Italians who have been less than generous so far and who might be embarrassed into action .... and it might prompt Tony Blair to make some wild promises (even if just to piss off Gordon) as a final hurrah ....

As President Bush said yesterday:
“Once again, the generosity of the American people is one of the great untold stories of our time .... Our citizens are offering comfort to millions who suffer, and restoring hope to those who feel forsaken.”

.... but if George really does want this to change the way that the world views America .... then lets just hope that somehow PEPFAR and the new son-of-PEPFAR will be run on policies based on real evidence and not ideology ...

Sisters are doing it for themselves ....

A few days ago I was visiting some of our sites in rural mountainous Mpumulunga in midst of the Deep Freeze that gripped the whole country ... we ourselves didn't have heating ... the electricity was skittish and the water supply was downright pre-menstrual ... one night Zanele, Bongani and I had to sleep in every item of clothing we had brought along it was so so cold .... so I was a little grumpy when I was asked to drive my colleague to meet with a support group at a nearby squatter camp ... sure to be even more cold, dark and miserable ....

I should explain here that in post-apartheid south africa .... most black people still live in the black townships, most indians live in the indian townships etc and the white people still live in nice houses in the suburbs .... but the older townships are fairly established communities now with cultures and infrastructure of their own .... the really poor people here live in squatter camps or "informal settlements" which are essentially wood and corrugated iron shacks clustered with no water, electricity, roads etc and incredibly high rates of crime ....

Realising that I couldn't get out of it ... i duly left my computer and credit cards in the B&B, took off my earrings, watch and anything else shiny .... keeping only some "mugging cash" on me for emergencies (better to have a few notes to hand over than to deny having anything at all) .... but i was pretty nervous as we navigated the dirt track and stopped at the shack of one of the women who leads an HIV support group that we work with ....

.... and then I heard the sound of music from within .... any of you who have ever lived in SA will know why i mention this ... south africans seem to be born with some natural ability to sing perfect four part harmony at the drop of a hat .... and every meeting or gathering starts and ends with music, singing and dancing ... its the sort of singing that seems to lift your soul with it (think the scene with the opera in the shawshank redemption) .... and makes you feel that somehow life can be beautiful after all ...

These women are poor - i mean properly rags-dirt-shack-beggar poor .... and yet they manage to band together each week and walk to visit all the other people in their community who are also HIV-positive to look after them and check they take their medications properly ... they don't ask for payment or glory ... they just do it out of a hope of something better for the whole community .... and when i walked in they greeted me as if i was one of their own .... and offered me hospitality as though i was the queen of england ....


They then proudly showed me their scheme to raise funds for themselves and ensure that they eat healthily .... a small area of green garden amidst the misery of the shacks .... growing sugar beets and sweet potatoes, spinach and tomatoes, papayas and avocados .... they have to dig with their hands and irrigate using precious water they ferry up in jerry cans ... and they don't let men into the group because they just steal the money and get drunk .... (the chap in the picture is my friend Bongani)

I was overwhelmed by what they have managed to do with no training, education or advice .... I reached into my pocket and found my emergency 500 rand (about $75) - and gave it to them for a wheelbarrow, seeds, a spade and some wire to keep out marauding chickens .... the hijackers and muggers would just have to find someone else to demand cash from today ....

Is Al joining the party?

Possibly the best president-who-never-was published an exerpt from his new book - The Assault on Reason today in the Guardian .... and quite aside from the vitriolic attack on the Bush administration ... it could quite easily also serve as an opening salvo for a presidential campaign ...

"The pursuit of "dominance" in foreign policy led the Bush administration to ignore the UN, to do serious damage to our most important alliances, to violate international law, and to cultivate the hatred and contempt of many in the rest of the world. The seductive appeal of exercising unconstrained unilateral power led this president to interpret his powers under the constitution in a way that brought to life the worst nightmare of the founders."

"We as Americans should have "known then what we know now"- not only about the invasion of Iraq but also about the climate crisis; what would happen if the levees failed to protect New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina; and about many other fateful choices that have been made on the basis of flawed, and even outright false, information. We could and should have known, because the information was readily available. We should have known years ago about the potential for a global HIV/Aids pandemic. But the larger explanation for this crisis in American decision-making is that reason itself is playing a diminished, less respected, role in our national conversation.

So - would he again? Could he again?
Would certainly make a change from the endless Hillary-Obama fundraising stories ...

Shades of blackness

There's a furore in South Africa at the moment .... involving the country's pet passions - Rugby and Race ...

It all centres around the man pictured - who has been declared by some of SA's top politicians as being Black ......

How you may well ask .... since the man is clearly White. Very White. Lily White even.

And herein lies the nub of the problem.

Luke Watson comes from an old activist family. His (white) father "Cheeky" Watson famously in the 70s relinquished his position in the Springbok team in protest against the apartheid regime - and instead played club township rugby in an impoverished region of the Eastern Cape.

For this he was arrested, beaten, had his factory burnt down, and the whole (white) family were subject to death threats for being a "kaffirboeties" (or kaffir lovers). For the blacks of the Eastern Cape - he was a hero .... and even coined a struggle chorus - "Siyomlandela u Watson!" (We will follow Watson!) for him.

Switch now to his son .... and despite the fact that Luke Watson captained many national junior teams and is now the captain of the local Cape Town rugby club (the Stormers) - he was not picked this season for the Springbok side. Half the country was furious .... and the other half felt the Watson family had it coming ... (to be fair there was also probably a significant fraction who didn't think he was actually good enough to be picked)

Then to make matters worse - the head of the rugby union overruled the coach and selectors - and personally included Watson in the team - on the basis that "forces" in rugby were still harbouring old-apartheid time grudges against the Watson family and so thwarting their progress ....
"Cheeky Watson was one of us, fighting for the liberation of this country. We cannot have a situation where those children get victimised because of their parents' actions."

The final twist was then for Luke Watson to be declared black by virtue of his family history ....
"Given where he comes from, and where his father deliberately chose to play his rugby, on the dusty, potholed fields of the Eastern Cape townships, Luke comes from a historically disadvantaged community. The coach shouldn't be looking at Watson as a white player. If there are white flankers of equal ability, then Luke should get the nod because of his family's history."

It is amazing however that once again we have politicianss here declaring who is black, and who is not .... it was not so long ago here that the following happened and now its the ANC ... Amandla the Rainbow Nation ...


Sidebar: Funny how this sort of mirrors the debate in the US ... would Obama be black enough on the new SA criteria?

Yet more south africa

The last i promise of "typical" south african stories .... but this one really infuriated me ...

I was at Edendale hospital this week ... yes the one where 80% of the inpatients have HIV .... where TB is second nature .... and where I can't even walk onto the paediatric ward without getting all teary .... and like all hospitals in South Africa - the nurses rule the roost and the doctors wander around looking like shell-shocked bunnies trying to fire-fight emergencies and generally do what the nurses tell them to ...

So despite my trepidation and knowing how it gets to me - I had to see some cases on the kiddies level (natch - i was told to by one of the chief nurses) ... and let me just say here that it is NOTHING like children's wards anywhere that i've ever been used to ... no toy areas or play therapy for these kids ... no bright colours or happy murals .... they just lie three to a bed .... and are so skinny that they actually fit .... and so sick they don't move very much ....

So imagine my outrage when i caught the nurses (all typically "rubenesque" zulu women) on the ward chomping down the hospital meals MEANT FOR THE CHILDREN!! And when i opened my mouth to protest - the ward sister just waggled her finger at me ..... and i meekly knew my place ....

Sometimes africa just bites you in the bum ....

Extreme home makeover ...

The GBF Peter made the big grown-up move and bought a house in Cape Town last year .... a house with a very typical south african story

Great aunt shirley had lived in the house for decades and decades .... until earlier last year - she was murdered on her own porch by the young black kid who had washed her car forever .... Peter only found out about the story when one of the drunks that seem to inhabit every street corner in the city (to be fair the "bergies" are always rather sweet and almost a relief compared with the other types nastiness that infest our streets) told him about the whole affair ....

But thankfully for peter - other gays have started move in to the area (" here comes the neighbourhood") ... and its now a teeming mass of cafes and boutique furniture shops and the all poor bergies are very bewildered ....

Anyhow 6 months after deciding to gut the place and armed with a gay architect, a lesbian builder and a gay project manager (apparently quite the hot team in town) .... peter finally overcame poor aunt shirley's house neglect and design ignorance ... and unveiled the most gorgeous and perfect little house in Cape Town with a very fabulous house warming party ....



It was all cocktail dresses and champagne ....one of those chattering-clattering beautiful parties .... and basically peter's very lovely friends made the place look so good (see above) that amazingspaces.com want to use the property for the movies and model shoots ... obviously we would all have be written into the contract as fixed adornment furniture .... but i think poor aunt shirley would have been very proud ....

PS - party pics and the house in full glory - all photo credits to the very wonderful Lisa Mastronardi

A very south african story ...

Crime, drugs and HIV - any country come to mind?

This story is from an area that I work in - its postcard-picture-perfect with rondavels straight out of a No 1 Ladies Detective agency book and has hills covered in romantic mistiness .... but sadly bugger all else to do but drink and have sex .... which would explain the massive rates of HIV ...

And so the local thieves have caught upon a new way to help while away days in tropical heaven .... you steal the ARV drugs from patients with AIDS (cunningly too weak to fight back) as they leave the ARV clinic .... and you smoke them with weed - which apparently give you a better high than anything else on the local market .... and then hope that it protects you from catching the HIV too .... genius ....