12 July 2003
Maputo — To the amazement of his listeners at the closing session of the African Union summit in Maputo on Saturday, Libyan leader Colonel Muammar Gaddafi described AIDS as "a peaceful virus", of which Africans should not be afraid.
Gaddafi was supposed to be giving a vote of thanks to Mozambique on behalf of the visiting heads of state and government. In fact, he took the opportunity to launch a rambling tirade, which jumped from one subject to another - from slavery, to the allegations of Iraq purchasing uranium from Niger, and finally to the benefits of AIDS, malaria and the tse-tse fly.
Ordinary mortals might regard this trio of illness as lethal plagues that ought to be exterminated. Not at all, according to the Libyan colonel.
"AIDS, malaria and the tse-tse fly are the enemies of our enemies", he declared. "They are the armies of God here to protect Africa".
Clearly all those people who spent so much time at the summit talking about the perils of AIDS - including incoming AU chairman, Mozambican President Joaquim Chissano, UN secretary- general Kofi Annan, and the head of UNAIDS, Peter Piot, had got it wrong.
"There are no problems with AIDS", declared Gaddafi. "AIDS is a peaceful virus, it's not an aggressive virus".
He dismissed concern about AIDS as "psychological warfare".
The only concern western countries had with the disease was to sell drugs, he claimed.
"They say AIDS came from monkeys in Africa, but monkeys have been in Africa for hundreds of centuries", Gaddafi scoffed. "They only say this to sell us their medicines".
"We should fight against psychological warfare", he declared. "We should not be afraid of AIDS. If people don't have strange behaviour, they won't be infected".
No doubt it will be of great comfort to the 60 million of so Africans infected with the HIV virus to know that the Libyan leader considers them guilty of "strange behaviour".
At the end of this performance, President Chissano remarked that Gaddafi "always speaks like that".
"He is very concerned and he expresses this in a dramatic way", said Chissano.
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