The New Idea

Omololu facilitates education and activism in the fight against HIV/Aids through an Internet-based dialogue and a national newsletter. He simultaneously addresses the information divide in Nigeria, caused by computer technology's inaccessibility, through developing a network of people who broadly share their resources or communicate the lessons learned online in a more public forum. He has established channels of communication among Aids workers in West Africa to share experiences and learn from the successes and failures of each country's grassroots, governmental, and corporate response efforts. Omololu also links to similar Internet-based initiatives in order to provide easy cross-referencing and networking.

The Problem

Access to HIV/Aids education in Nigeria remains limited and sporadic. Apart from the leaflets produced by local and international organizations, there is no single clearinghouse of resources and current information. While the Internet could help bridge this gap, the cost of access in Nigeria is extremely prohibitive, especially to activists and those with the disease, who suffer from severe prejudice and cannot find help from discreet, private sources. As a result of major communication boundaries, no sense of solidarity has been established between service providers, advocacy organizations, and educators, and fear of intellectual property theft has bred a climate of counteractive competition. There are several initiatives in Nigeria, such as the recently inaugurated National Action Committee on Aids, which work independently and only occasionally meet to share ideas, with little or no follow-up.

The Strategy

In 1998, Omololu created the Nigeria Aids Bulletin after attending the first Nigerian National Conference on Aids. Omololu posted reports of the conference on a few Internet-based discussion forums, receiving a tremendous and immediate response. The e-bulletin includes full-length news stories, feature articles, and sections such as "Call to Action" and "People and Resources," which provide information on materials, best practices, and linkages to international HIV/Aids organizations.

After a year of successfully running this bulletin, Omololu created the Nigeria-Aids Forum at http://www.egroups.com/group/nigeria-aids, based on polls circulated to all previous subscribers. Members discuss current issues and information about HIV/Aids in Nigeria and receive the monthly Nigeria Aids Bulletin and postings about upcoming conferences, research reports, and grant opportunities. Members can also post information about themselves or their organizations and make anonymous inquiries about health issues.

To encourage Nigerians to attend the 13th International Aids conference in Durban, South Africa, Omololu created a second forum, Durban2000Community at http://www.egroups.com/group/durban2000community. This forum provided updates on all aspects of the conference, including the agenda, participants, details of satellite meetings, and abstracts. Over two hundred people from all over Africa subscribed and post-conference evaluation showed that the online forum contributed substantially to the high number of Nigerian participants at the conference.

Omololu recognizes that one of the weaknesses of the Nigeria-Aids Forum is that it is intrinsically restrictive and not easily accessible to millions of Nigerians who cannot afford email or Internet access. This impacts the most vulnerable groups–poor youths in areas where there are no cyber cafés. Omololu has developed a network of Information Technology Friends in communities across the country to overcome this obstacle. IT Friends are people with Internet connections who provide neighbors access to the forum. They also share information from the forum with health professionals in their communities and help Aids practitioners develop an international network with their peers in Ghana, The Gambia, Liberia, and Senegal.

The Person

Omololu has been working in the area of HIV/Aids since 1997. He holds a Masters degree in Political Science and is a recipient of the South African Broadcasting Corporation/Rhodes University Highway Africa 2000 Award for Innovative Use of the Internet, the International Aids Society Award for Young Investigators, and the Simon Nkoli/Gugu Dlamini Frontliners Award for Outstanding Work in the Area of HIV/Aids in Africa. His experience with computers at the 1998 World Aids Conference in Geneva got him interested in the Internet as a medium for HIV/Aids education and was a turning point in his career in journalism.