NGO calls on society to fight HIV/Aids

KIGALI - Eastern African HIV/Aids activists visited Kigali last week to devise more strategies of promoting greater involvement of civil societies in the war against the disease. Officials from National Networks of HIV/Aids Service Organisations (EANNASO) met with various HIV non government organizations. Eannaso’s official in charge of networking support and development, Titus James Twesige, headed the team. He told a two-day interactive meeting that Eannaso aims to better community responses to HIV by enhancing the capacity of national HIV networks and promoting greater involvement of people living with HIV. “We do networking and information advocacy. We help to give information on strategic planning and organisational development advancement,” Twesige said at Alpha La Palisse last month. Aimable Mwananawe, Chairman of Rwanda NGO forum on HIV/Aids, observed that civil societies play a leading role in the fight against HIV. “Fighting the HIV is everybody’s responsibility. We are here to work out plans how to engage civil society to help fight the disease,” Mwananawe said. Eannaso’s officer in charge of monitoring and evaluation, Myra Dangana Deya, explained that they plan to measure the involvement of society in other countries in the region. Eannaso acts as the collective voice of its member networks, one of its roles is to articulate regional issues surrounding HIV and Aids to the international community. The network partners with 13 countries that include Burundi, Comoros, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia and Kenya. Others are Mauritius, Rwanda, Seychelles, Somalia, Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda.Ends