Kaunda soldiers on in anti-AIDS campaign

Zambia's first president Kenneth Kaunda was commander-in-chief of the armed forces for close to three decades. Today, in his retirement years, he is marshalling the country in a war against HIV/AIDS. "I have declared a war (on AIDS) and at 78-years-old, I am its strongest and fiercest enemy. I will look AIDS in the face and say, 'I will fight you with every ounce of energy'. I am like a mad man because I see the devastation. I want to stop this scourge before it annihilates mankind," he told PlusNews. One in four Zambians are infected with HIV. Kaunda lost his fifth born son, Masuzgyo, to AIDS in 1988. "I draw courage from the deaths of the millions of people all over the world. I have lost so many family members, my grandchildren, to AIDS. I cannot sit by and watch this disease run riot in my family. I have to protect and defend them. Since every one is affected by AIDS, we should all be fighting together," he said. But Kaunda tests the boundaries of Zambian culture when he talks about HIV and its transmission, in a country where public discussion of sex is a taboo. Kaunda describes it as "breaking the wall of silence". His contemporaries, those that were in his government, have spurned requests to join him in his crusade. That has left Kaunda as the only high profile political figure in Zambia - who clearly and repeatedly enunciates the words "sexual intercourse" - to lead the campaign. His openness remains a little unnerving for Zambia's conservative 10 million population. People have come to accept talk of HIV from health personnel and NGOs working in the field. Politicians and civic leaders only ever mention it when there is an international donation or "event", and that is never voluntarily or with any profundity. Bashi mpundu (father of twins) as Kaunda likes to refer to himself, says this is the one instance in which he agrees that 'silence kills'. "I prefer to keep silent over contentious issues and act quietly. But on this one, I cannot ... culture merely regulates social behaviour, it is meant to help society, if it becomes an impediment or harmful, get rid of it." A strong traditionalist himself, Kaunda said breaking the taboo on sex-related issues was not easy, but when he saw what AIDS was doing, he had to overcome his inhibitions. To the church's mortification, Kaunda, a staunch catholic, has embraced the use of condoms, especially among the young. The response from the catholic church, which wields considerable influence in Zambia, has been acerbic. The more milder attacks have been from religious leaders like evangelical churches director Joseph Banda, who labelled Kaunda's anti-AIDS vigour as "misdirected" as far as the use of condoms was concerned. He urged people not to listen to him. Kaunda's response was to tell the church to open its eyes and see how AIDS was ravaging congregations. "The church is the one that is misdirected. They have misunderstood my message. What I am saying is, control your sexual temper and behave yourself. [But] since we can neither monitor or control people's urges, let them use a condom. I myself have never needed to use one, but that does not mean I should stop others." He added that he was pleased to hear that there was now a "woman's" (female) condom. The church should be at the forefront of the anti-AIDS campaign, Kaunda said, arming people with information to allow them to make informed choices. Anything else was cowardice. "If they do not want to talk about condoms and sex in their churches I will do it for them ... The clergy perhaps are not happy, but the congregation are very receptive," he added. While the accolades are piling up for his work in the area of HIV/AIDS, the question that is being asked is why Kaunda is talking about AIDS now, when he is no longer president, with considerably less national influence. The experience in Uganda has shown that when President Yoweri Museveni led his country in talking about AIDS and condoms openly, backed by government programmes, transmission levels fell to one of the lowest in Africa. Kaunda claims he discussed AIDS while he was in office, especially after his son died, but it fell on deaf ears. He said people are more inclined to hear him now, because the AIDS situation has reached crisis proportions. However, a check with public records showed that, apart from admitting that Masugzyo died of AIDS during a press conference in 1988, there are only a couple of general public statements that Kaunda made on AIDS while he was president. Retired politician Grey Zulu, a close friend of Kaunda, tried to explain. "For serving government officers or politicians to talk about AIDS means they must commit to resource allocation and mobilisation. Zambia did not have and still does not have resources to combat or deal with AIDS. It represents a failure which politicians don't want to talk about much," he told PlusNews. But in the meantime, in his twilight years, Kaunda has taken up the challenge and soldiers on.