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Nozizwe fears for SA Aids plan
11/08/2007 09:12 - (SA)
Johannesburg - The dismissed deputy health minister who was credited with revamping South Africa's beleaguered campaign against Aids has expressed fears that her work would be undone now that she has been forced out.
Speaking for the first time since she was fired late on Wednesday, Nozizwe Madlala-Routledge told reporters of clashes with her boss, Minister of Health Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, who has been heavily criticised for her promotion of garlic and lemons as Aids remedies.
Her firing has drawn new attention to rifts within the governing ANC, as well as raised concern about the direction of Aids policy in one of the countries hardest hit by the epidemic.
Madlala-Routledge said there was still much "excitement and enthusiasm" for a new five-year plan she helped create to combat Aids.
"People are waiting to see if the spirit of unity we had achieved will remain intact," she said at a news conference in Cape Town that was broadcast nationally by CapeTalk radio station on Friday. "We really do need a united front. I hope that will remain,"
Aids activists
President Thabo Mbeki fired Madlala-Routledge late on Wednesday without giving a reason. Madlala-Routledge said on Friday she was fired for attending an Aids conference in Spain without Mbeki's permission and for comments about poor conditions in a rural hospital that contradicted statements by Tshabalala-Msimang.
Mbeki - whose own record fighting Aids has been criticised by Aids activists - is a staunch ally of Tshabalala-Msimang, whose husband, Mendi, is a powerful figure in the ruling African National Congress.
Madlala-Routledge's dismissal was criticised by Aids activists - included several who demonstrated in her support during the news conference, waving placards calling for Tshabalala-Msimang to be fired instead. Opposition politicians also expressed outrage.
The health department, contacted for comment after Madlala-Routledge's news conference, issued a statement accusing her of having been inattentive as a minister, questioning her version of events, and saying it was committed to the new Aids plan, which was launched this year at a time when health minister Tshabalala-Msimang was sidelined by illness.
During the nine months the minister was ill, Madlala-Routledge mended fences with Aids activists and the mainstream medical community and worked with them to draw up the new plan.
Issue of nutrition versus drugs
The plan has made reducing the number of new HIV infections one of its main targets, and aims to extend drug treatment to 80% of those with Aids by 2011. Tshabalala-Msimang and Mbeki had in the past questioned the effectiveness of drug treatment.
When Tshabalala-Msimang returned to work in June after a liver transplant, her first public gesture was to snub South Africa's national Aids conference on the grounds that her deputy had been given a more prominent speaking role than her.
"There were differences of opinions between myself and my former boss on a number of things," Madlala-Routledge said, adding that she had nearly been dismissed two years earlier when she spoke out on the issue of nutrition versus drugs in the treatment of Aids.
"Two years ago the minister of health said to me: 'I will fix you.' And maybe she has fixed me," she said.
The health department statement, citing Tshabalala-Msimang, said: "No such statement was ever made."
Madlala-Routledge said she stayed in the department even though "life was not easy." She said it had been difficult to get information from officials in the department and that senior managers had been instructed not to work with her.
"It is stressful. Staff pick up tensions and loyalties are questioned and divided," she said.
The health department statement said Madlala-Routledge was "always invited" to meetings, but accused her of missing many of them, adding that "on the few occasions that she was present, she would mostly be attending to her mobile phone while the discussions were underway."
Not for politicians
Madlala-Routledge said Mbeki did not approve of her trip to Madrid, where she had been invited to speak at a seminar held by International Aids Vaccine Initiative.
"He believed that the meeting was not for politicians. He believed that politicians have nothing to say in a conference of technocrats and researchers," she said, adding that once she was aware that the trip had not been sanctioned by Mbeki, she did not attend the meeting but returned to South Africa as soon as possible.
"It was a lost opportunity for the country. I was due to speak about the urgency in finding a vaccine. Until we see progress in the development of a vaccine the future of our people is not promising," she said.
Under pressure to explain his decision, Mbeki's office issued a brief statement in which it noted comments made by Madlala-Routledge.
"In the interest of both the government and Madlala-Routledge, and cognizant of the fact that she is no longer a member of the Executive, the Presidency will neither be responding to her statements nor giving reasons why she was relieved of her duties," the statement said.
- AP
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