UNAIDS: The First 10 Years

UNAIDS The First 10 Years30The resolution also stressed that priority should be given to the Programme’s activities at countrylevel, and urged the six to initiate country-level programme activities as soon as possible.From the outset, and for many years to come, there would be a lack of clarity about the roleof the Secretariat and about how exactly the Cosponsors would work with the Secretariat.This created confusion among staff, governments, nongovernmental organizations andothers who worked with UNAIDS. It also exacerbated the existing tensions between thecosponsoring agencies and the Secretariat.Kastberg explained his vision: “What we would be creating at the central level [i.e. theSecretariat] would be a big department on HIV that was part of WHO, part of UNICEF, partof the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), of the United Nations PopulationFund (UNFPA), of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization(UNESCO) and the World Bank. We knew it was a difficult construction but we thought it wasbetter to construct it that way and then make sure the Member States would follow up onthe boards of the Cosponsors to make sure they would act as good Cosponsors of UNAIDS.[But] they didn’t in general and I think Member States were not sufficiently strong in ensuringconsistency of [the Secretariat’s] approaches in Geneva and New York”.Several years later, in the spring of 2000, when Kathleen Cravero joined UNAIDS as DeputyExecutive Director, the concept of the Secretariat was still not fully understood. She recalledthat the idea of UNAIDS as a Secretariat did not always come easily to staff members,whereas she felt the aggravation was worth the final result.“The idea of a Secretariat, of being a Secretariat, was not doing things ourselves but gettingother organizations to do things. The really euphoric moments of seeing this diverse groupof agencies around a table come together around a contentious issue – the moments wheneverybody dropped their institutional mandates and their self-interest in a solid, constructiveway behind an important issue – was enormously satisfying. For me, it was worth manymonths of aggravation, to see that happen. But that’s what being a Secretariat is about.Unfortunately, many people in the Secretariat didn’t really understand the essence of thisrole and when they figured it out they didn’t really want to be part of a Secretariat”.Back in the summer of 1994, ECOSOC had laid out a timetable to ensure that the new JointProgramme would be operational no later than 1 January 1996. The interagency workinggroup of the six agencies, established in 1993 to develop the plans for the new Programme,was formalized as the CCO, composed of the heads of the six agencies and charged withinterim responsibility for overseeing the transition to full implementation of the JointProgramme. This committee was a compromise, explains Kastberg, “not necessarily a goodidea … but to engage the heads of the UN agencies, the Cosponsors, and in part to ensure