DRC: Music artists and young HIV activists launch "ZWA NGA BIEN" (Look at me well) campaign to challenge stigma, lack of knowledge

Ahead of World Aids Day 2017, MSF this week launched a national multimedia awareness campaign "ZWA NGA BIEN" (Look at me well) aimed at young urban audiences living in Goma and Kinshasa, DRC to address the lack of information and stigma that is still associated with HIV in Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

Staff in MSF’s HIV projects in Goma and Kinshasa developed the campaign after observing the daily impact of huge levels of stigma and misinformation facing people who living with HIV (PLHIV), which leads to many people not getting tested and treated for HIV early enough. While 570,000 people are estimated to be living with HIV in DRC, this is only 1.2% of the country’s population, which means low awareness about HIV and limited knowledge about testing and treatment.

Staff felt that music was the best way to ‘normalise’ HIV by taking it out of the medical arena into people’s everyday lives.

The #ZWA NGA BIEN campaign is lead by Lexxus Legal and Sista Becky, two popular artists from the Congolese music scene, who have committed to working alongside HIV activists from the "Jeunesse Espoir" (Youth hope) association and MSF to overcome the ‘taboo’ of HIV and positively encourage young people to get tested.

Their title music video "ZWA NGA BIEN" in (Lingala/French, available with French, English subtitles) is a direct call to people to change their point of view, to turn misperceptions around people living with HIV into knowledge, awareness and acceptance. The track was written by Lexxus Legal & Sista Becky while listening to the testimonies of Jeunesse Espoire activists, who also appear in the video. The lyrics deliver a strong and inspiring call to fight misinformation, prejudices, isolation and social disregard for HIV and people living with HIV.

#ZWANGABIEN