The Kingdom of Swaziland hosted the ACB’s annual retreat from January 5-9, 2018. This retreat was under the theme “Achieving Africa’s Ability to End the Three Diseases: the role of a strong Bureau for Africa”.
The aim of this retreat was to take stock of the past year and to plan for 2018.
The past year has in many respects been rich and intense. The ACB has grown and now boasts of 5 staff. The Bureau hosted a number of key events not in the least including the Annual Consultative Meetings (ACMs) which were held in April and October through which African countries participated in the Global Fund Board and committee deliberation. The annual report is being prepared and will be available on our various platforms.
The annual planning drew on the lessons learned in 2017, and on the possible improvements to be conceived and put in place for the proper functioning of the Office. Key aspects future work includes strengthening Government participation by collaborating more with African Governments via the AU and Cluster-Based Learning Networks (CBLNs).
CBLNs will be launched in 2018 and will see African countries in Central Africa, West Africa, East Africa and Southern Africa converge in their respective clusters to identify regional opportunities, obstacles and shape Global Fund policy and decision-making in a bottom-up approach. We will come back to this in a future article.
The meeting ended with a dinner graced by former ACB Board member, Hon. Benedict Xaba and the Minister of Health of Swaziland, Sen Sibongile Ndlela – Simelane, was represented by the Director of Health Services should be Dr. Vusumuzi Magagula.
