His hostile views on HIV, and open enmity with PLWH in his home country; Sudan, has changed drastically to acceptance and inclusion. He is now committed to their societal rights and their cause. He as an Imam of one of the biggest mosques in the country has played a significant and effective role, not only with the faithful who frequent his mosque, but also with members of most vulnurable groups like prison mates, and commercial sex workers.

He is Sheik Muhammad Hashim El Hakim, a member of the Sudan’s Religious Scholars Committee, and a HARPAS consultant. We have interviewed him to know more about how hard and tiring it was for him to take this path, how is it now after all his accomplishments in this area, and how far the religious discourse has been changed in terms of the way Imams and preachers are responding to HIV/AIDS in the Arab Region.

Interviewed by Ahmed Balah:

When did you start tackling HIV and its related issues in the Arab Region?

I want to be honest with you. I was one of many who took a loathing stand towards HIV and PLWH. I was entirely rigid in response to the needs of PLWH in the society I live in, especially in stigmatizing them. I used to think that once we provide a safe space for them to surface, and then allow them to openly speak about their HIV statuses, this will largely contribute to the propagation of wrong behaviours.But after a considerable amount of time in meeting some of them, and listening to them, I started to change gradually.

The First Encounter

How was it like to meet a person living with HIV for the first time? And what made you meet him, in spite of your negative views?

At first, I had to stand by a person living with HIV in my neighborhood for medical reasons, I was obliged to do that because I was the Imam of this area, and he needed my help to change, which was one of my tasks as a preacher. I was committed to meet with doctors to educate me on the correct way to treat him. They explained that the virus cannot be transmitted via regular day to day living .This caused me to think, so fear and stigma began to dissolve. I looked at the entire thing deeper, I acknowledged that every man needs GOD including sinners, and the more accepting the environment is for PLWH, the more open they will be about their conditions, and that will contribute to the disease control.

What was your next step, right after you changed?

I began to focus my efforts in this area, and became a specialist. I gave lectures about HIV, and I also received numerous training workshops from various UN agencies and some NGOs on HIV/AIDS. I have done so much reading on the subject as well, and then I felt that it was about time to begin my own work and initiatives in response to AIDS. I am partnering with the Ministry of Health in Sudan, and other NGOs, and I believe that we reached out to many PLWH through these activities, and through my lectures on HIV in my mosque.

You have mentioned NGOs. What are the important ones?

Well, “Save International” is one, and “Sehha wi Afia “; a Sudanese NGO is another one that I consider one of the few pioneering NGOs in this field. We have introduced PLWH to people in mosques, and that was a good opportunity that we seized. At first people had to take their time to accept them, but with time it became acceptable for a person living with HIV to give his/her live testimony inside the mosque. We teamed up to make this successful, I as a religious leader, a doctor, and a person living with HIV would appear together as a team to introduce HIV/AIDS. This was just the beginning, as it led to more lectures which contributed to the change of hearts and minds. It changed many misconceptions and incorrect information on HIV. We have worked together to dispel HIV stigma, and to eradicate the negative way in which people used to see PLWH .I have frequently visited the AIDS section in many Sudanese hospitals. At that time, the numbers of estimated HIV cases rose up to 600,000 in Sudan. This reminds me of my brother El Omda, May God bless his soul who passed away because of the disease. He was a true leader. He was the first Arab citizen who stood up, and spoke to the media and said:” I am a person living with HIV”. Because of him, we had so much progress, because he decided to break the silence, and speak about the suffering that many PLWH have to go through daily including himself because of Stigma and discrimination that run deep in our societies.

Can you give examples of stigma and discrimination you witnessed throughout your job as an Imam?

Some Imams, or even relatives of deceased persons because of HIV refused to attend the deceased’s’ funeral, or even pray for them thinking that they do not deserve mercy because they were sinners. I attended their funerals and I performed the rituals of the funeral prayers, which had a great positive impact, and made many people, think differently

The “AIDS” Imam

You as an Imam and a religious leader in a religious society like the Sudanese society, did you face obstacles when you began responding to HIV and PLWH and started to give them support? Did you face any kind of objection from the people in your mosque for example? How was your response to that?

I work as an Imam and a preacher in one of the biggest mosques in Sudan, and I was successful in building the mutual trust between me and the faithful who frequent my mosque. It happened gradually, but they now trust me, and I rarely face disagreements, or make some people think that I am doing what I am doing for personal interest; on the contrary I was able to convince most of them that I am doing that for the sake of the entire society with all its members. I owe that success to GOD. My dedication to learn more about communication skills, NLP, and management which taught me effective methods of communication with groups and masses, but the main obstacle was from within; which was my fear of facing the community if I tackled HIV. I feared stigma and discrimination myself , I even heard several times some people were saying that if I was not infected with HIV myself I would not have been so dedicated to HIV response, this was the first problem , some people used to ask me : ” Are you the (AIDS Imam) “? . There are some who call me that as we speak, and I know they stereotype me.

So this was my first issue that I had to deal with; my inner fear, and thanks to God, I am now a fear- free person, and forever.

The other obstacle was from the public who knew nothing on AIDS. You see, average people will even refrain from shaking hands with a person living with HIV, they will simply panic. The way I dealt with it is by introducing PLWH in my company. This way worked effectively, and I praise GOD who guided me to that. I appeared with PLWH publicly scores of times in the media, with the police, in prisons, and inside mosques I lectured at. There are some lectures I gave in military sites, at police stations, and in prisons. I lectured on HIV every where I can have access to.

How was the response of the religious community leadership at the very beginning?

You may know that many of them in the Arab Region, believe in the conspiracy theory, and many of us – religious leaders – pose ourselves as defenders of the society which is true, but we also hear about the cat that eat her kittens for protection, and the mother who isolate her boy, and never let him out of the door to protect him, then he will grow up with no knowledge about life in the streets. What I am trying to say is those leaders sincerely believe in conspiracy theory, and hold on to it. They even went so far to consider those who speak about AIDS is a conspiracy in itself, and they blame other religious leaders who “deviate” from mainstream religious leaders who encourage the use of condoms for protection. Some of them said it clearly:” Who wants to commit a sin, let them do it “.

I once talked to one of these leaders at one of the big lectures for religious leaders in the ministry of health. I was talking about PLWH, and then he said:” Do you want me to be merciful to those who have been punished by GOD himself?” You see, it’s the conspiracy theory and GOD’s punishment belief that became the biggest obstacles to HIV response. Many think that a person living with HIV is being punished by GOD. I have dealt with this mindset very aggressively, and I referred back to faith where GOD showed mercy to the people in many situations, so even if the infection is a punishment from GOD, does it mean that this punishment lasts for ever? GOD accepts the disbelievers’ repentance, why does not he accept others as well?

In your opinion, what is the role of religious leaders to stop the spread of the disease in light of the growing numbers of HIV infections in Sudan?

In Sudan, we live now an era of openness about HIV, so we as religious leaders can say what we want about the subject, without being monitored except for a few red lines that the government thinks it might hurt the AIDS cause. The Sudanese government is progressively responding to HIV. National AIDS program in Sudan was one of first programs that were established in the Arab Region. There are other programs for prevention and HIV awareness. The government established such program not only a small office like the case in some other countries. But I have to admit that the major shift was in 2003, when the government openly admitted that the HIV situation is serious and has to be dealt with.

In 2005, the Ministry of Religious Affairs established a consulting office consisted of religious leaders who have been assigned to respond to HIV across the country, and then the partnership with UNDP/HARPAS was established to train the religious leaders on HIV. Before that we partnered with some NGOs, and I personally worked with some organizations to train religious leaders based on the Islamic training kit – a HARPAS product – in many different regions in Sudan. We also used the Christian and Islamic training kits to train military personnel and leadership. We attended many training workshops with HARPAS to obtain advanced trainings to understand how to respond to HIV efficiently. We now have a national plan for training that covers 13 different states in the north of the Sudan, which we accomplished 50% of it, and it’s working quite well.

Partnership with HARPAS

When did your work with HARPAS begin?

I am honored to be one of the ones who began working with HARPAS on the Religious Leaders Initiative from the scratch. We put the corner stone of this breakthrough initiative in the Religious Leaders meeting in 2006 in Syria- Damascus. We attended this meeting to begin planning for the way we want to work with Religious Leaders. We announced the draft for the authoring of the Islamic and Christian training kits, and we also created the draft for Cairo Declaration. Then we started to prepare for the Cairo colloquium which hosted 100 well known Islamic and Christian figures, and about 20 International organizations. We did not sleep day or night in the time preceding this important meeting. We were able to sit together, and it was like a battle at first, but we finally came to common ground. Thanks to GOD, we launched the Cairo Declaration, and the Islamic training kit draft which I was honorably delegated to write, and get the approval of major scholars after some changes in the draft.

HARPAS was successful in getting the Arab Societies to make this momentous shift. Dr. Khadija’s dedication to the cause particularly contributed to the success of our mission. Dr. Ehab’s experience contributed to that as well. Now, I look back and I can’t believe how much work we were able to accomplish in just a few years.

The workshop that we are attending at the moment has gone beyond HIV. I have noticed that the content and the used methods , have gone beyond AIDS, and its tackling capacity building of the participants which can lead to not only HIV response but it also can address other societal challenges in the Arab Region , so how do you see HIV in a developmental context ?

AIDS drew the attention of governments and researchers to other challenges that impact our societies. You see HIV stigma comes from fear, and fear comes from ignorance, so AIDS is not the issue, the issue is ignorance. Ignorance is the main cause behind lack of HIV prevention, ignorance will make people not take necessary precautions or it will make them belittle the disease, all of which are just applications of ignorance and lack of awareness. I believe that ignorance is the driving force behind the AIDS challenge. AIDS is only a symptom, the true cause of it is ignorance, and in turn; ignorance can be traced back to other root causes in our societies, which we need to deal with as well.

What are the most significant activities that you contributed to the Sudanese society to tackle this important challenge?

I believe that Sudan is the number one country in terms of HIV response among all Arab countries, and I can owe that to national consensus on the seriousness of the disease, because of the growing numbers of infections which is higher than other nations. The policies that the government applies, the officials commitment, and the pouring of funds from international donors have contributed to that change at all sectors of the country. Medication is available, but only 5% of those who need it can’t get it, because they are the ones who came out on the surface and demanded their right to treatment. We have medical clinics, and well equipped hospitals to service PLWH. There is direct work with most vulnerable groups, and there are studies and surveys on truck drivers, female tea sellers, and inside prisons.

We have come to a point where we included HIV in educational curriculums in primary schools. VCT is available everywhere, and we have some successful experiences with that, like doing VCT in the middle of shopping areas, where equipped mobile cars will spread awareness in the markets, and then they begin the VCT with those who want it.

On a personal level; I work for a foundation on programs that aim at reaching out to most vulnerable groups, and we were able to dedicate a hot line for them. We reached out to as many as 200 female commercial sex workers, and around 50 men having sex with men. We talked with them on safe sex and abstinence as well. We were able to make many of them feel self worthy. Our programs focus on personal values to build self esteem, and pursue ambition. Dr. Ehab’s ideas and trainings for some of our team members in Cairo have contributed largely to our success. Now, we succeeded in getting some female commercial workers to be trainers, they have also flied out of Sudan to get more international training in various countries. We also have documented researches on Homosexual activities, which I consider very unique and rich.

The Religious Discourse

At the end of this interview, I would love to know how far the religious discourse was impacted in terms of responding to PLWH?

I would like to assure you that those who received HARPAS training have changed positively. In fact; religious leaders who were trained with HARPAS have changed their attitude towards PLWH. As for other religious leaders and Imams, I think that some institutions started to understand the situation. I still believe that we are far from achieving the goal; they still need to be reached out to, communicated with, and get them to be involved in training workshops, dialogue and other awareness raising activities concerning such important subject.