Minister slams NGOs
Posted by African Press International on June 15, 2007
Maputo (Mozambique) Mozambican Health Minister Ivo Garrido on Thursday attacked non-governmental organisations (NGOs) working in his country for being arrogant in dispensing work to local communities.
Opening a national conference on “Community Involvement in Health Care” in Maputo, Garrido said there were well-intentioned efforts by the NGOs to provide health services and health education to communities.
But this was not the same thing as community involvement, he pointed out.
“Let’s be clear. In Mozambique, as in other parts of the world, we have witnessed ways of working with communities that are nothing but attempts to impose on those communities, in a more or less disguised way, what they ought to do.
“These are improper and counter-productive ways of mobilising communities for health,” the minister said.
He added, “The problems are analysed by technocrats but solutions are cooked up in advance.
“The overall package is presented to the communities, supposedly to hear their comments, but in practice it is expected that they (communities) will approve” it.
The mere fact of working alongside communities and their leaders should not be confused with mobilising communities for promoting their own health, he argued.
Garrido said he wanted to see this national conference making a break with uncoordinated and sometimes improper practices of the NGOs.
Published by Korir, African Press in Norway (APN)/ African Press International (API) source.Apa
