06 Jul 2016

A USAID official, Mr Mike Park has applauded the Civil Society Organisations (CSOs), community, government  and other stakeholders for  the successful  implementation of the MAATLA project.

Speaking during the close out meeting of the project, he said through their partnership, they managed to reach the objective of the project which aimed at strengthening the organisational and technical capacity of CSOs to deliver high quality HIV and AIDS, and health related services.

The MAATLA project implementation started in May 2011 and scheduled to end in May 2016, but was extended to end in September this year. The project is funded by USAID.

Mr Park said through their collaboration with the donors, they highly focused on making a positive impact on HIV issues in Botswana and assured them a continued support in the future.

“The end of the project does not mark the end of our support as we are committed to help Botswana to fight HIV/AIDS,” he added.

He assured the key stakeholders and Batswana at large that the USAID would assist in funding more activities in the future towards the fight against HIV/AIDS.

Giving an overview of the project, the chief executive officer of Fhi360, Ms Barbra Mudanga explained that the project which was funded to the tune of US$17,2 million was implemented in four districts being Ngmailand, Chobe, Okavango which had the highest prevalence in HIV/AIDS and Ghanzi which had the highest prevalence in tuberculosis.

She said the project focused on three key result areas which all were achieved, noting that the  goal of the project was to significantly and sustainably strengthen the capacity of the civil society sector in Botswana to support HIV/AIDS and related health service delivery.

She said since the implementation of the project, the CSOs have benefited a lot as they now have improved governance and organisational systems, adding that the project assisted in training of leadership boards on strategic leadership and governance.

She also pointed out that the MAATLA project also provided technical support to NACA for development of the CATCH Model and evaluation of CATCH Model piloting.

She noted that the project also managed to strengthened district level systems for providing and coordinating HIV/AIDS services in hard-to-reach areas.

The quality of project data has also been tracked and it showed improvement over the life of the project- due to routine district quality assessment process which was carried out on a quarterly basis. 

Regarding the lessons learned, Ms Mudanga said capacity strengthening was mutual and need trusting relationships from both the service provider and the recipient and have to accommodate each other’s uniqueness.

She also mentioned that involvement of local volunteers is effective because of their familiarity of volunteers with local culture and use of local language. It was also reported that there was an active facilitation of partnerships and collaboration among CSOs and health facilities and among CSOs is critical for improving health outcomes including the referral system. 

Ms Mudanga acknowledged USAID, Botswana government, PEPFAR, MAATLA partners and other key stakeholders for a job well done in making the project a success.ENDS