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Why Global Fund turned down Zimbabwe
Bertha Shoko, The Standard (Zimbabwe)
November 19, 2006

http://www.thestandard.co.zw/viewinfo.cfm?linkid=11&id=5311&siteid=1

THE Global Fund to fight malaria, tuberculosis and HIV and Aids has finally officially communicated to Zimbabwe the reasons why its Sixth Round application was turned down a fortnight ago, ending weeks of speculation.

Zimbabwe’s application for more than US$300 million to the Global Fund for the three diseases was turned down by the funding body’s Technical Review Panel (TRP).

The TRP consists of independent experts in disease control and development economics from universities and development institutions around the world.

The Standard understands that the Global Fund notified Zimbabwe on Friday of the result of Round Six and that members of the Country Co-ordinating Mechanism (CCM), are yet to meet on the matter and review the reasons why the TRP turned down Zimbabwe’s request for funding.

The CCM, which is chaired by the Minister of Health and Child Welfare, David Parirenyatwa, is responsible for preparing grant proposals for consideration by the Global Fund.

Although the CCM had not yet received any formal communication from the funding body on the matter, Parirenyatwa’s deputy, Edwin Muguti, was in the State media early in the week attacking the funding body for being "politically biased".

Muguti, was quoted in the State media as saying he was more than convinced that the funding body lacked objectivity and that Zimbabwe would "go it alone" and not seek funding from organisations with ulterior motives.

While Muguti was breathing fire, a calm Parirenyatwa told The Standard that Zimbabwe would give the official position as soon as the CCM had had a chance to meet and review the fund’s decision.

He said it was for this reason that he could not disclose the reasons for the denial of funding.

However, highly-placed sources privy to the matter, said the TRP’s main reason was that Zimbabwe sought to expand its already successful Round Five application that had not even taken off.

Sources said: "Zimbabwe’s grant proposal was meant to expand Round 5 application, and the TRP wants to see that Round 5 grant gets underway and can operate well before it approves more money for the roll out.

"If the Round 5 grant actually works reasonably well over the coming year, my guess is that Zimbabwe’s Round 7 application will have a much greater chance of being recommended for funding with a few changes."

The other reason was that Zimbabwe had included a provision to pay health personnel extra money to compensate for inflation, in an effort to retain their services.

A problem arose with this proposal when it emerged that this proposal would only benefit a few districts as this meant that there would be impossibly large salary differences between neighbouring districts, said sources.

The TRP was unanimous that this would not work.

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