UNAIDS: The First 10 Years

UNAIDS The First 10 Years150Sidibe explained that the Evaluation was a wonderful foundation for him. It enabledUNAIDS to move forward, to give “a face to UNAIDS actors in country”. He saw his role asa bridge between the policy- and decision-makers and the implementers at country level.The original mandate of UNAIDS, he believed, had not sufficiently stressed the importanceof country ownership and had not focused on priorities at country level. The “call” fromthe Evaluation was to improve the functioning of the UN system to help to support thenational response.Soon after his arrival at UNAIDS, Sidibe organized the evaluation of the National StrategicPlans on AIDS in 113 countries. This review provided the basis for redesigning UNAIDS’country-level work; it revealed that most of these plans had not been made operational –for example, government officials’ fervently expressed resolve to fight the disease had notbeen translated into specific, time-bound goals and targets, let alone into clear directivesfor achieving these; furthermore, the few existing operational plans had not been costed.“It was now time to move from conceptualizing, to hard planning, to implementation”.UNAIDS needed to change its profile at country level; there was a “big gap between PeterPiot’s [UNAIDS Executive Director] role at global levels and what the Country ProgrammeAdviser was supposed to do”, explained Sidibe. He stressed the importance of understandingthe difference between political advocacy and advocacy for implementation,which is an important role for UNAIDS, as is disseminating country-specifi c information,not only global reports, as had been the case until then.Programme Advisers to Country CoordinatorsThe originalmandate had notsufficiently stressedthe importanceof countryownership andhad not focusedon priorities atcountry level.One of the key decisions of UNAIDS’ governing body in 2002 was to strengthen capacity inthe following three areas: monitoring and evaluation, resource mobilization and tracking,and social mobilization and partnership-building. As a consequence, there was a roll-outof more staff to countries, and the Country Programme Advisers (CPAs) were renamedUNAIDS Country Coordinators.This signified an important upgrading of the role, providing the Country Coordinators withmore authority and making them full members of the UN Country Team in each country.There was considerable Cosponsor resistance to this change, in particular from old-styleUN Resident Coordinators, despite strong support from Mark Malloch Brown, the UnitedNations Development Programme Administrator. The UNAIDS Country Coordinators nowbecame central to the coordination of the response in countries, rather than performinga passive, supportive role. This was a major change, explained Sidibe. Under the newarrangement, the UNAIDS Country Coordinator became the prime source of informationand intelligence needed to confront the epidemic, and was accountable for the UN’sperformance.