20th International AIDS Conference: « what you do for us, without us, is against us »

From this 20th to 25th July 2014, a 20th International AIDS Conference has been held at Melbourne in Australia. Young People Living with HIV have asked for assistance.-By Diane Uwimana

Cédric Nininahazwe (on the right hand) playing the panellist’s role ©Iwacu

Two Burundians among 12.000 participants have attended the conference and been involved in different discussions, sessions and panels. “We have heard about ambitious strategies to achieve the end of AIDS such as the “90:90:90” and the “All in” campaigns. We celebrate the willingness of those initiatives but we’re seriously concerned about the fact that they’re not considering the meaningful involvement of Young People Living with HIV, our voices, our needs and our passion to reach a world where we have healthy, dignified and meaningful lives”, points out Cédric Nininahazwe, Deputy Chairman of the National Network of Young People Living with HIV (RNJ+) who has participated in the Conference.

He indicates that he and his Burundian fellow Désiré Habonimana, from Young Women’s Knowledge and Leadership Institute Burundi-YOWLI-Burundi, have benefited more from the Conference: “Even if we were very few in the conference, we have shared experience with others, and thanks to this international conference, we have gained partners and more visibility”, says Nininahazwe.
The Deputy Chairman of RNJ+ notes that during the Conference, he remarked that youths face the same challenges such as the lack of different services, information… “The worst thing is that many people take our place to decide what the youth need, we don’t need somebody else to think at our place because what they do for us, without our consent, is against us,” indicates Nininahazwe.
According to him, partners and other people who want to help the youth to fight against AIDS must work in collaboration with them in order to succeed their objectives.
Cédric Nininahazwe mentions that he has been assisted by the “Alliance Internationale” and that conference is always held after each two years.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————–
Youths who have participated in the 20th International Conference and are active in the Global Network of Youth People Living with HIV. They have made a statement and asked UNAIDS/UNICEF to:
– Ensure that there are clear specific targets for adolescents and young people living with HIV to ensure that the world reaches the ambitious strategies of ending AIDS by 2030 as well as the 90:90:90 campaign;
– Consider us key partners in the global HIV/AIDS response on behalf of all adolescents and young people living with HIV;
– Support Y+ to establish networks of YPLHIV where they do not exist and to strengthen networks of YPLHIV, so together we are all interconnected and able to push the agenda of YPLHIV;
– Provide capacity building and technical support to better advance programs responsive to the needs of YPLHIV and monitoring and evaluation of HIV programs in our communities;
– Foster YPLHIV linkages and joint collaboration with national agencies, AIDS programs and other key partners at country level;
– Involve Y+ in the development of initiatives and work plans that are specific needs of the adolescents and YPLHIV communities.