Press Release

American Cultural Center and Walvis Bay Corridor Group Partnership to Prevent HIV/AIDS in the Namibian Transport Sector

The Director of the American Cultural Center, Ray Castillo, donated 500 copies of the NamibiAlive II CD’s to the Walvis Bay Corridor Group HIV/AIDS Help Desk at a ceremony in the American Cultural Center auditorium on Tuesday, February 03, 2009.  The Walvis Bay Corridor Group will distribute this HIV/AIDS prevention CD to truck drivers at weigh bridges around the country, as part of its collaboration with the Roads Authority, to all of its participating member companies, and as part of its Truckers’ Toolkit. 

Two Peace Corps Volunteers – Will Garneau and Beth Phillips – produced NamibiAlive II, in 2008 (a follow on project to the highly successful first CD).   It includes songs and messages from some of Namibia’s most popular musicians, and each song is prefaced by prevention, stigma reduction, or a positive living messages.   The concept behind this innovative prevention project is to offer prevention messages to this at-risk community while they listen to their favorite artists.  To date, the Peace Corps Volunteers and the U.S. Embassy’s Public Affairs Office have distributed five thousand CDs for free to bus, taxi, combi, and truck drivers.   The American Cultural Center funded the project through a U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) grant.  

 “I am proud to be in partnership with the Walvis Bay Corridor Group HIV/AIDS Help Desk.  Peace Corps Volunteers initiated this innovative project and the Walvis Bay Corridor Group is keeping it alive, fighting the epidemic on the roads.   They have the expertise and the contact with truck drivers to continue its success.  Without these partnerships, we cannot be successful in ridding Namibia of this disease.  I salute the efforts of everyone involved, and thank the Walvis Bay Corridor Group for their vision in continuing the distribution of the NamibiAlive II CD,” Mr. Castillo said in his remarks at the event. 

Mr. Edward Shivute, Project Coordinator of the Walvis Bay Corridor Group HIV/AIDS Help Desk concurred.  “Our experience has also revealed that workplace programs alone are not effective in terms of reaching truck drivers and this is due to the fact that truckers spend more than 90% of their time on the road when on duty.  The research findings strongly indicate that a significant percentage of truckers prefer, and would relate more to, materials that are user friendly and that will not interfere with their daily routines of driving.  We are, therefore, adamant that HIV/AIDS education through music is one of the sustainable approaches and it is against this reasoning that we believe that this generous donation of NambiAlive II CDs from the American people do not only contain HIV/AIDS message from some of our local talents but also provide some sort of entertainment through local music.”

For more information, please contact Public Affairs Officer, Ray Castillo, at 0811280816, or Information Specialist, Roger Lyners, at 229-801 [ext. 226].