Not Afraid To Speak Out

By Simon Robinson/Kampala

Major Rubaramira Ruranga knows something about fighting. During Idi Amin's reign of terror in Uganda in the 1970s, Ruranga worked as a spy for rebels fighting the dictator. After Amin's ouster, the military man studied political intelligence in Cuba before returning to find a new dictator at the helm and a bloody war raging. Hoping for change, Ruranga supplied his old rebel friends with more secrets, this time from within the President's office. When he was discovered, he fled to the bush to "fight the struggle with guns."

The turmoil in Uganda was fueling the spread of another enemy--AIDS. Like many rebel soldiers, Ruranga was on the move constantly to avoid detection. "You never see your wife, and so you get to a new place and meet someone else," he says. "I had sex without protection with a few women." Doctors found he was HIV positive in 1989. "They told me I would die in two to three years, so I started preparing for when I was away. I told my kids, my wife. Worked on finishing the house for them. I gave up hope." But as he learned about AIDS, his attitude changed. After talking to American and European AIDS activists--some had lived with the disease for 15 years or more--"I realized I was not going to die in a few years. I was reborn, determined to live."

He began fighting again. After announcing his HIV status at a rally on World AIDS Day in 1993--an extraordinarily brave act in Africa, where few activists, let alone army officers, ever admit to having HIV--he set up a network for those living with HIV/AIDS in Uganda, "so that people had somewhere to go to talk to friends." And while Uganda has done more to slow the spread of AIDS than any other country--in some places the rate of infection has dropped by half--"we can always do better," says Ruranga. "Why are we able to buy guns and bullets to kill people and we are not able to buy drugs to save people?" The fight continues.

--By Simon Robinson/Kampala