AFRICANS GETTING
INVOLVED
It’s
time for Africans with HIV in the UK to fight for their rights, says Beatrice
Nabulya, George Rwamakuba and Edith Kaggwa
Over the years, negative media coverage and ever changing legislation relating
to immigrants and HIV has had a grave impact on the health and well being
of the affected communities, especially Africans.
The Changing Tomorrow conference, held in Leicester last year, brought together
many people living with HIV from across the UK. It was extremely encouraging
to see Africans there in number - and visible.
Long-term survivors, newly-diagnosed, and HIV service users, workers, volunteers,
supporters and advocates were all represented in this diverse group. But we
all had one thing in common: concern over the hopelessness and destitution
resulting from the ever changing laws around immigration and asylum. There
were also concerns about people testing HIV positive and being denied access
to treatments. The significant number of interested people at the conference
provided an opportune moment for Africans to start a dialogue, and to address
our concerns.
Our concerns are many: deportations within and outside the UK; dispersal to
areas outside London; expulsion from the UK; detention; new regulations restricting
access to NHS treatment; the promotion of HIV testing amongst African communities
without guarantee of treatments; HIV and criminalisation.
There have been campaigns and lobbying by organisations like THT/Lighthouse,
NAT and others, with support from the All Party Parliamentary Group on Aids.
But input from Africans has been limited. Our gay brothers have led the battle
for the rights of positive people and fought for the services we have today.
And there has been much work done by the minority group of women who gave
birth to organisations like Positively Women. But the face of HIV is changing
and affecting more and more immigrants. It is time we all joined that battle
- hence the birth of Africans Getting Involved (AGI).
Africans Getting Involved aims to bridge the gap between the grassroots and
policy makers through greater involvement of Africans living with HIV/Aids.
We want to influence government policies by lobbying and campaigning for the
social, economic, health, and immigration rights of Africans living with HIV/Aids
and improve access to services. We want to create a representative platform
for Africans to effectively work together. We want to use existing structures
to build capacity among positive African people at the grass root by encouraging
participation in NHS patient programmes and user involvement programmes within
HIV organizations.
Our first meeting in Leicester attracted over 40 people. UKC has offered their
facilities to AGI although it is important to stress that the group will operate
as an independent body. We must lobby for all African and interested community
organizations to get on board. We have started building a data base of members
and a ‘story bank’ for lobbying purposes. We aim to be more pro-active
and ready to respond to issues like media coverage.
Since our last meeting 30 October 2004 in London, AGI at attended a debate
at the English Speaking Union on compulsory HIV testing of all immigrants.
We are sure our contribution swayed some people and the debate ended in a
draw. We also made presentations to the Oxford Students Union StopAids Campaign
and at the Shaping Tomorrow conference. We are planning to attend Mohammed
Dica’s re-trial and to hold a peaceful demonstration around Parliament
Square to make the voices of African people living with HIV and Aids heard.
AGI supports the Campaign on Access to HIV Services for All Migrants to the
UK, sponsored by the All Party Parliamentary Group on AIDS, the National AIDS
Trust and THT. It has circulated details of this campaign to all its members
urging them to sign up. There is also letter writing campaign to MPs from
January on this issue. After all, this is exactly what AGI is about.
• For more info contact: ekaggwa@ukcoalition.org
