Siphiwe Hlophe is the co-founder of Swaziland for Positive Living, an NGO that provides counselling and education, and seeks to improve the living conditions of people who are affected by or infected with HIV in the rural areas.
[2] She is also the President of Positive Women,[3] a UK-based charity founded by Kathryn Llewellyn and Stephen Brown In 1999 Siphiwe Hlophe was working as a manager in a hotel chain when she won a scholarship to study agricultural economics at Bradford University.
This showed the stigma that is attached to HIV in Swaziland,[6] and spurred Siphiwe Hlophe on to co-found SWAPOL to help others in similar situations.
[7] Siphiwe was one of the first women to publicly declare her positive HIV status.
We are people who know what it means to face discrimination and rejection, but who have the will to live", says Siphiwe Hlophe.