Kampala Tatler #3: Meet The Darling Waste (DW)

A 24 year old Transgender (Stiletto) in the outskirts of Kyengera Town has just received the last injection a dose that was necessary following untreated malaria.  All this medical care was done at home under the able care of a doctor who regularly made community outreach visits for bedridden LGBTIQQ. Sometimes he used his car or took a Boda. All expenses paid out of his pocket yet there was funding selfishly hoarded by the so called leaders purporting to fend for the so called Homosexuals in Uganda! It seems all the hullabaloo is about court cases or some legal matter and not, I repeat, not Public/Mental Health! Sadly!

If only there is someone who could provide about 5 kgs of Soy powder, paraffin, 10 kgs rice, 5 kgs sugar, 2 kgs powdered milk and companionship................This was the prayer running through Stiletto's mind.

The doctor, not only bought the medications but regularly provided food and paid rent for many LGBTIQQ Living With HIV.

Enter, Darling Waste (DW)!!! 

A gold watch, long strips of silver braces cover tobacco stained teeth, Calvin Klein suit and gold cufflinks. 

They recently won an award of $ 200,000.00 for their organization proposal whose aim was to care for LGBTIQQ living with HIV as well as provide basic medical care and counselling. Their organization's name is Selectively Impossible But Unclear Methods (SIBUM)

When it was heard that Stiletto was getting better two days after, Darling Waste (DW) came to visit. Not when Stiletto was so ill.......... but after!

So, DW  promised to pay for the next six months' rent, food and medication if Stiletto was ready to denounce the doctor and claim this doctor was irregular and a government spy! 

So, SIBUM takes the responsibility of caring for Stiletto. In the next two weeks Stiletto was able to walk about and was given a front desk reception job once every Wednesday at SIBUM. 

Stiletto signed documents left, right and centre but never knew what about! The six months' house rent never materialized nor did the nutrition support. Meanwhile, DW switched suits, shoes and watches almost every hour. There is not a bar in which DW never set foot. Not long the $ 200,000.00 was blown away.

Around this time, Stiletto caught pneumonia so severe that it took 2 weeks for Stiletto to get well. In all these two weeks DW never visited but was aware since Stiletto never came to work on the Wednesdays! No one bothered to inquire!

This darling of the Uganda LGBTIQQ clique of leaders is untouchable, so spoilt and a waste of money and time.  Currently, it is said DW left Uganda and it is alleged the matter of accounting for the lots of money provided to SIBUM is still to be done! 

Leave HIV care to people who know, have the patience, professionalism and temperament. 

The LGBTIQQ community in Uganda, should indeed startup HIV Response and Support Organizations.....BUT.....These groups should identify different psychosocial support activities. 

And they are numerous. 

It would be effective if all of them do not compete but rather diversify response activities. These could range from Music, Dance, Drama and Performing Art; Gardening; Sports; Housing, Nutrition; Chaperoning to increase ARV adherence and the like. It is my hope that we do not have any more DWs within the LGBTIQQ Community of Uganda. Their actions should be denounced in the strongest words possible. Their selfish acts deny quality life opportunities for many LGBTIQQ Living with HIV. 

Funders, please stop giving money to some of those organizations which have been around for long, have the same faces of people going to New York, Reykjavik, Stockholm, Rotterdam and back to New York! It is too much! They are now so used to glamour activism that they are a barrier to HIV response and roll back please!