David Ensor: Secretary Powell and HIV-AIDS in South Africa

David Ensor

David Ensor is CNN's national security correspondent. He is reporting on Secretary of State Colin Powell's visit to South Africa.

Q: Can you tell us briefly about Secretary of State Powell's itinerary in South Africa, who he has been seeing, and how he has been received?

Ensor: He's been seeing South African President Thabo Mbeki, the foreign minister and others in government, and he has also spent some time in Soweto, a township, trying to get a first hand view of the impact of HIV-AIDS on this nation. One in five sexually active adults is HIV positive.

It is remarkable to see an African-American U.S. Secretary of State in Africa. He is received sometimes more like a rock star than a politician, but he is also controversial. He had a meeting with students at Witwaterstrand University in Johanesburg, and there was some heckling from students protesting against the U.S.-led economic sanctions against Iraq, saying they were causing Iraqi children to starve, but he was very effective at facing down some protesting students. There was one who called him a modern Uncle Tom for attacking Saddam Hussein during the Gulf War, to which Powell replied, "it was not America that invaded Kuwait, it was your friend Saddam Hussein." He got loud applause. He's good with these groups, and on the one hand he's very popular in Africa, on the other hand, he is, with some, controversial.

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Q: Powell said he didn't talk to South African President Mbeki about AIDS. What was on the agenda during his meeting with Mbeki?

Ensor: He's hoping to convince the South African President to put the kind of pressure that only a powerful next door neighbor can put on Robert Mugabe, the President of Zimbabwe, to try and get him to hold free and fair elections next year. There is an economic and political crisis in Zimbabwe, and the United States blames Mugabe for allowing the rule of law to collapse. Powell was quite blunt in his speech today, saying we need to put the kind of political pressure on Mugabe that he will feel he has to hold a free and fair election.

Q: Is South Africa's AIDS problem significantly different from other African nations?

Ensor: It is one of the worst. The impact here has been greater than in some other nations, and it is becoming clear to the South Africans just how bad it really is. The disease hit a couple of other nations before this one, but now the numbers are beginning to go up rapidly in South Africa. There is a certain amount of dispute about the numbers, but the United Nations' numbers for 1999 show one in five sexually active adults to be HIV positive. There were more recent numbers showing that 24% of pregnant women being treated in clinics for ante-natal care were HIV positive. So the fear is the numbers have a long way to climb yet, and the impact on this country will be extraordinary. There are predictions the population will soon reach zero growth and go into decline

Q: President Bush's foreign aid chief, Andrew Natsios, has described Mbeki's views of AIDS as "unorthodox." How does this influence U.S. aid policy to South Africa?

Ensor: Secretary Powell repeated just about as many times as he had an opportunity, that as far as he's concerned, HIV is the cause of AIDS, the scientific community agrees with that, and we need to move forward on that understanding. He said that numerous times today, and that is an implicit rebuke for President Mbeki, who once argued that the link between HIV and AIDS is not proven. So while not directly contradicting Mbeki, he is saying implicitly Mbeki is quite wrong on this, and he wanted to repeat it as many times as possible today to try and get the message across.