I wish to thank Her Worship Councillor Manana for inviting me to participate in
this commemoration of World Aids Day. Our Mayor has done us a great service by
organising this event, for there is not one among us who is unaffected by
HIV/Aids. This disease, which has been with us for decades, has claimed millions
of lives. It has left us with orphans and child-headed households. It has
challenged productivity and weakened our labour force. It has placed our
healthcare system under duress. And it has strained relationships between family
members, lovers and friends.

Yet, in the midst of this, we have risen to the challenge of fighting HIV/Aids.
We as a nation have taken a stand and moved forward, albeit with faltering
steps, towards stopping the onward march of this disease. In 2007, the United
Nations reported that three quarters of the world's deaths from Aids occurred in
Sub-Saharan Africa. The country worst affected, was our own. South Africa had
the highest HIV/Aids prevalence in the world.

Today, the fight against HIV/Aids is a national priority and our Government has
finally given it the attention it demands. We have seen significant success in
stopping mother-to-child transmission of the virus as anti-retrovirals have been
made available at clinics. We are keeping pace with the initiatives of the World
Health Organisation, which is now promoting medical male circumcision as a means
of decreasing HIV infection in heterosexual males. We have also a come a long
way from denying that the Human Immunodeficiency Virus causes Aids.

It has been a long and often difficult journey to reach this point, but we did
it. Now we need to take the fight further, learning from the missteps of the
past and moving with the necessary haste. Too many lives have been lost, that
could have been saved. Let us not lose one more individual to a disease that is
both treatable and avoidable.

Unfortunately, when I speak about HIV/Aids being treatable, I am not talking
about a cure. We may be months away from that, or we may be years away. For now,
we can only prolong life and support good health in people living with HIV. We
cannot cure it, either through science or any of the appallingly misguided
claims about sexual intercourse with a virgin, or the rape of a child. These
senseless beliefs have done nothing but increase sexual violence in our
communities, devastating more families and ruining more lives. This has to stop.

As we commemorate World Aids Day in 2013, I would like to speak about my own
part in the fight against HIV/Aids and the role my Party has played in bringing
South Africa to this point where we are seeing HIV infection slowing down.
Before I do that, though, let me explain to you why this matter is so close to
my heart.

I have been a leader in politics for more than 60 years. I have given my life to
serving my country and I have worked relentlessly for the wellbeing of my
people. When HIV/Aids was first identified as the killer that it is, I
recognised an enemy that I would spend the rest of my life fighting. With every
death, I intensified my commitment. Every loss was personal to me. But there was
such taboo and stigma around HIV/Aids that for a long time we did not realise
how many lives we were losing.

As little as ten years ago, no one spoke about HIV/Aids except as a
depersonalized disease that many anonymous people were struggling with. When
someone died of Aids, it was usually said that they had died of TB or pneumonia,
which are secondary infections. But how would we win this battle, unless we were
willing to talk about it? As a political leader and a traditional leader, I knew
that I needed to break the taboo.

On the 30th of April 2004, my family and I buried my son, Prince Nelisuzulu
Benedict Buthelezi. He had died six days earlier at the King George V Hospital
in Durban. As I stood at his funeral, I knew that I could not maintain the usual
silence that accompanied a death from Aids. I therefore announced at the funeral
of my son that Prince Nelisuzulu had succumbed to his long fight with HIV/Aids.

Just three months later, on the 5th of August 2004, my daughter Princess Mandisi
Sibukakonke Buthelezi lost her battle too, and died of HIV/Aids. Again, I was
honest and lifted the veil on this anonymous disease, giving it a face; the face
of my daughter.

The following year, on the 6th of January 2005, former President Nelson Mandela
lost his son, Makgatho Mandela, to HIV/Aids, and found the courage to speak up
about what he called “an ordinary disease”. The silence was broken. At last we
were talking about HIV/Aids in a language that everyone could understand.

Mandela and I were not the first to lose children, and we would not be the last.
But I believe that breaking the taboo ultimately saved lives, and certainly made
the lives of those suffering with this disease a little easier. My intention was
to wage a national war of HIV/Aids, which is what we did. But it was also to see
families healed.

At that time, families were torn apart by HIV/Aids, with some believing that
sharing eating utensils with their HIV positive child might get them infected.
Some believed Aids was a form of righteous punishment for homosexuality, and
brought shame to a family. Those suffering were often spurned, vilified or
abandoned. There was a tremendous amount of fear, anger, contempt and confusion
within families coming to terms with HIV/Aids.

I knew, from personal experience, that anyone diagnosed with HIV needs their
family's support more than ever. This is an ordinary disease, and like any
ordinary disease it is hard to accept and process. It requires lifestyle
adjustments and may ultimately necessitate specialised care. We may want to
treat HIV/Aids as mundane, because millions of South Africans have been affected
by it. But for the individual, it is a difficult journey and one on which the
love and support of family is essential.

Let me speak now about another journey; one on which my Party, the IFP, embarked
in 2001. At that stage, thousands of babies were dying as the HIV infection
passed from mother-to-child at birth. At my request, the IFP began investigating
what would be needed to save these little lives. It became apparent that a
single dose of the anti-retroviral, Nevirapine, to the mother and a single dose
to her new-born infant could prevent infection and ensure an HIV negative status
for the next generation. It could be done easily and affordably.

Under the leadership of our then Premier, Dr LPHM Mtshali, the IFP-led
provincial government rolled out access to Nevirapine at clinics across KwaZulu
Natal. I am proud to know that because of what we did, thousands of lives were
saved. There are children entering high school next year who would not have
lived past a few months, except for the intervention of the IFP. I am very proud
of that.

But, at the time, it was a bitter-sweet victory. Because, knowing how simple it
was to save lives, we could not fathom why national government refused to do it.
The Treatment Action Campaign took national government to court challenging
their policies on HIV/Aids and pleading for the roll-out of anti-retrovirals at
clinics across South Africa. Government had a fundamental constitutional
obligation to save lives. But they just refused.

National government told the Constitutional Court that it was logistically
impossible to do what the Treatment Action Campaign was asking it to do. But the
IFP knew this was not true. We therefore joined the Treatment Action Campaign's
litigation as amicus curiae, a friend of the court, and explained that it could
be done, and that we had in fact done it quite successfully in KwaZulu Natal.
This enabled the Constitutional Court to rule, in July 2002, that national
government had an obligation to roll-out anti-retrovirals across South Africa.

That was the real moment of victory. Now, years later, national government
boasts about all they have done to decrease the rate of HIV transmission from
mother-to-child. And we are right there, celebrating with them, because we know
that this is not an IFP victory. It's a victory for all South Africa.

This journey has had many more milestones and it is right that we remember them.
For today though, let us celebrate the fact that we can beat HIV/Aids. It is
possible. But it will take more than a national initiative to stop this disease.
It will take an individual commitment from every one of us to do what it takes
to stay healthy.

In this fight, the emphasis should never be taken off the advocacy of
faithfulness, abstinence and the use of condoms. Abstinence is the only absolute
guarantee against HIV/Aids for both men and women, whether heterosexual or
homosexual. Faithfulness requires a sustained commitment from both partners.
Condoms, used with every sexual encounter, protect both men and women.

These are the only ways to protect our health. I encourage you to get tested.
Know your status. And then do the right thing and speak to your partner. Aids is
not a death sentence, but it will change your life. It will require you to be
more careful about your health; to get proper nourishment and sufficient
exercise. It will require you to stop damaging activities, like alcohol and drug
abuse. It will require you to be honest with intimate partners and use a condom.

These are all positive actions that every one of us should be taking, regardless
of our HIV status. If we want to make a positive contribution to our
communities, our families and our nation, we need to take care of our health.
Part of this is a return to sound values, like faith, discipline and honesty. If
we are to heal our nation, these values must find a place in South Africa again.

From highly visible national leaders, to adolescents in Ulundi, we all have a
part to play in healing South Africa. It starts with taking care of our own
health.

I thank you.