Thursday 3 August 2017

Dear, respectfully, Mr. President Donald J. Trump Jr.

The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue


Dear, respectfully, Mr. President Donald J. Trump Jr.


I am writing to you with joy but at the same time hopeful that this short letter will reach you.

In 2003, I was part of a team that mobilized people in what was a rural county (now Bukomansimbi District) in Uganda with a population of about 70,000 to witness the first PEPFAR grant disbursement. At long last, about 800 people would be assured of ARVs. I still hear from those people. Many are still alive up to today thanks to PEPFAR.

Mr. President, please continue with the support that America is contributing to the Global Fund mechanism. PEPFAR is flexible and the ease with which it can address the HIV-related needs has empowered communities to be resilient in the face of AIDS. I want to restrict myself to Africa.

Mr. President if the $ 4.3 billion the U.S. will contribute is instead withdrawn, there is a cascade of broken systems that will follow. PEPFAR filled up the extended family support void which was affected when able-bodied kin and kith died of AIDS in Africa. PEPFAR facilitated the presence of a conduit of prevention knowledge and skills. Communities developed the critical HIV care and advocacy competencies which are the major barricade through which TB and MDR TB will find a hard time breaching. Not to mention, additional HIV infection and AIDS-related deaths.

Mr. President I am, with the utmost humility, asking you please to provide the funds that the U.S. government committed to PEPFAR. 

I look forward to hearing positively from you. I do follow you as one of your Tweeter fans. Actually I got to know  you the year you hosted President Gaddafi of Libya in New York.

I am wishing you all the best, you are our president.

Sincerely,


Tom R. Muyunga-Mukasa