claidheamhmor (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
claidheamhmor) wrote2009-12-18 03:00 pm
claidheamhmor) wrote2009-12-18 03:00 pm
Manto died
So, Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, our controversial ex-Minister of Health, died. Rumour goes that her transplanted liver rejected her.
I know it's all politically correct to forgive someone after they've died, but I don't have any sympathy for her. Her HIV/AIDS policies in government led to the premature deaths of possibly hundreds of thousands of people.
The Treatment Action Campaign, the organisation that eventually forced government to supply anti-retrovirals, called on South Africans to forgive Manto in a rather pointed, back-handed way (something I thought was rather clever):
"We hope that the world and the mothers whose children died or were infected by HIV/Aids find it in their hearts to forgive her", and "She was a cadre who contributed to the liberation of South Africa, although her HIV/Aids policies made her an enemy of South Africans."
Gareth Cliff, a local DJ, made a Twitter post that made some people rather unhappy, including the former Deputy Minister of Health, Renier Schoeman, who called on Cliff to apologise for his "viscous" [sic] comments.
While Manto may have done some good things during her tenure, all that is overshadowed by her policies that caused so many deaths.
I know it's all politically correct to forgive someone after they've died, but I don't have any sympathy for her. Her HIV/AIDS policies in government led to the premature deaths of possibly hundreds of thousands of people.
The Treatment Action Campaign, the organisation that eventually forced government to supply anti-retrovirals, called on South Africans to forgive Manto in a rather pointed, back-handed way (something I thought was rather clever):
"We hope that the world and the mothers whose children died or were infected by HIV/Aids find it in their hearts to forgive her", and "She was a cadre who contributed to the liberation of South Africa, although her HIV/Aids policies made her an enemy of South Africans."
Gareth Cliff, a local DJ, made a Twitter post that made some people rather unhappy, including the former Deputy Minister of Health, Renier Schoeman, who called on Cliff to apologise for his "viscous" [sic] comments.
While Manto may have done some good things during her tenure, all that is overshadowed by her policies that caused so many deaths.