Treatment Action Campaign

Yesterday on the 7 March'08 we(TAC reps from each sub district in metro) attended the WC NACOSA PSP meeting with some reps from the DOH & ALN.
The meeting was attended by about 80 people which does not represent all the departments, NGOs, sectors and structures within the metro. On Tuesday we had a meeting to strategise around the way they do the meeting and to go their to tell them that this is not consultation and plans should come from districts first before they can make a draft.

On the program we had the introduction and Maureen van Wyk from NACOSA did the NSP & PSP process & context. Dr Najma Shaikh didn't even do her presentation on Prevention treatment care and support, Mr S Sithole(Deputy Director WCDOH) did some explaination about Research, monitoring & surveillance and Dr Johanna Kehler from ALN took about 5 minutes to talk about Human rights and access to justice. Most of the people that was their did not even understand what the word PSP means cause I had to explain it in the group I was. From the start of the meeting Sk, Gilad and myself cornered the whole panel around the process and the fact that these meetings should happen at a district level, we questioned the issue around the submissions that will be send to NACOSA website and what will be the process after the submissions and who coordinates the submissions if anyone or organization can just send it.
We also wanted to know if they keep on talking about the MSATs what communication they had with the MSATs(cause the MSAT coordinators that was there wasn't aware what's expected of them in terms of setting up district meetings for consultation), we also wanted to know what did they put in place to support the MSATs so we can ensure a proper process. We also questioned the way the PAC is operating and when will the restructuring process take place and that we want a civil society rep to be the chair of the PAC and we also asked them why the Premiere is not involved with the PAC or the PSP. We wanted to know who's the sector reps cause they need to call meetings before the 15 April'08 cause that's the cut off date for submissions.

We were then split into groups to answer these 6 questions and we were evenly split amongst the groups. Every TAC member in the group was suppose to influence their group to either put all our suggestions like we discussed in our Tuesday meeting or to get the group to understand why this process is wrong in the way they are doing it. Only SK and myself could convince our groups not to fill the questions but to rather explain to them what they need to put in place and how they need to consult before we can call it a draft. Sk and myself were also doing the feedback to the plenary on behalf of our groups. I was first to
present. Our group did not do any of the questions, we wanted to know
what are they going to do with it and why we weren't given 14-7 days notice about the questions so people can come ready with the answers.
We wanted the committee that drafted this document to come to the district level to come and explain this document. We also wanted them if not the 85 document then at least the shorter version of the document must be translated in Xhosa and Afrikaans so people on a district level can understand. I also explained to Mr S Sithole that the presentation that he did on the M & E wasn't good enough and he needed to go and simplify it so everyone can understand it when they come to the districts. I then went over to explain what needs to be put in place for the MSATs to have proper consultations with all the stakeholders per sub district. We wanted finance for each sub district, someone from NACOSA to assist them in setting up these meetings, we wanted the committee that drafted the plan at these meetings to come and present, we want all documentation including the 6 questions to be circulated to all the relevant stakeholders per sub district so people can come fully prepared to this meetings and we also wanted this document to be translated and lastly we wanted the sectors to have parallel meetings within the province.

Sk's presentation on behalf of his group was done slightly different but
the same message. The other two groups tried to answer the questions
with some of our suggestions in between.

*WAY FORWARD
*We don't think that they are going to come to the district unless we make them come, cause at the end of the meeting Maureen (director
NACOSA) was still going on about the submissions that can be send through not saying anything about coming to districts.
We get the sector reps in the PAC to call sector meetings and us leading the PLWAs in the province.(cause we represent the PLWAs in the PAC) We will also set up a meeting with all the MSAT coordinators and help them setting up district consultations and make NACOSA & DOH come to these meetings

I think we our achieved in showing them that the way they running this process is wrong and that the plan should be a combination/integration of district plans before we can call it a draft.

Thanking

Freds
TAC WC