The Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) has rejected a claim by the Department of Health that it is reconsidering the government’s invitation to attend a United Nations General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) on HIV/Aids next month in New York.
”This statement by the Department of Health is an outright lie and a distortion of the facts”, TAC general secretary Sipho Mthathi told the Mail & Guardian Online on Tuesday.
In the statement the health department said it was encouraged by the comments of Mark Heywood, head of the Aids Law Project and TAC treasurer, on a radio talk show on Monday. According to the statement, Heywood said the TAC would reconsider its decision to decline the government invitation.
”Heywood’s comments have been ripped out of context. We have not reconsidered the invitation. The TAC has not changed reasons for declining; we still object to the way the government hand-picked this delegation. The statement by the Department of Health is part of their desperate plan to resolve this matter,” Mthathi said.
After initially being barred from going to the special session, the TAC last week turned down the department offer to be one of 14 civil society organisations to join the South African delegation to UNGASS. Mthathi felt the process of selecting and announcing the delegation had been unsatisfactory.
Spokesperson for the Department of Health, Sibani Mngadi, told the Mail & Guardian Online that the claim the TAC was reconsidering, was ”based on comments by Mark Heywood in a public medium”.
Mngadi expressed hope that the dispute would be speedily resolved.
But it appears Mthathi has already made up her mind.
”The TAC and the Aids Law Projects will be going to New York, but as independent organisations and not as part of the South African delegation.”