Daily Independent Online.
*
Tuesday, August 24, 2004.
U.S offers N84m
to combat AIDS in Nigerian Armed Forces
By Chris Agbambu,
Deputy
Bureau Chief, Abuja
The government of
the United States of America is to assist the Nigerian Armed Forces with over
N84 million to fight the dreaded Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS)
scourge now prevalent in the military.
United States
Senator Chuck Hagel, chairman, Senate Foreign Relations sub-committee on
International Economic Policy, who announced this in Abuja on Monday during a
joint conference with Minister of State for Defence, Dr. Roland Oritsejafor,
said the US was supporting Nigeria to address the challenges HIV/AIDS posed to
global peace and stability.
The senator, who is
on tour of five African states, and accompanied by the U.S Ambassador to
Nigeria, John Campbell and the US European Command Deputy Commander, General
Charles Wald, said a laboratory of excellence would be set up at Mogadishu
Barracks, Abuja.
The centre, he said,
would expand the reach of HIV/AIDS treatment to the Nigerian military to treat
not only soldiers and their dependents, but also Ministry of Defence civilians
and people living in the local communities.
Hagel said the
focus of the laboratory would be on vaccine research for HIV/AIDS, but said it
would also provide a range of care, from testing and diagnosis to research, to
anti-retroviral therapy and treatment of opportunistic infections such as
tuberculosis.
He said the
Mogadishu barracks’ laboratory of excellence would be funded with about
N28 million initial funds for state of the art equipment and another N14
million for renovations and improvement of the structure, power generation and
water supplies.
He added that in
this year alone, the Nigerian military received N80 million support, stressing
that the money was for the training of public health educators, peer
counsellors and the establishment of an HIV surveillance system within the
military.
Responding,
Oritsejafor said the visit was part of the continuing military to military
relationship between the US and Nigeria, adding that Nigeria as an important
player in global peacekeeping operations, needed a healthy military.
Hagel, Republican
from Nebraska had earlier met with President Olusegun Obasanjo to discuss
broad-based US, Nigerian bilateral relations.
