His first name is Holy, which seems fitting somehow two weeks before Christmas.
During an interview Monday, Holy Moyo's story began casually enough, with talk of his previous life in Zimbabwe, Africa. It was not until he was gently prompted by his counsellor at the John Ruedy Immunodeficiency Clinic, located within St. Paul's Hospital on Burrard Street, that Moyo told the entire story of his escape from Africa to Vancouver.
It's not pretty.
As an officer with the Zimbabwean Republic Police in Bulawayo, the second largest city in Zimbabwe, Moyo was forced to beat, imprison and even kill people whom he suspected were innocent of the crimes they were accused of. He watched as the country he loved crumbled under the control of dictator Robert Mugabe. Come election day 2002, Moyo's fellow police officers were called into headquarters and forced to vote for Mugabe. But not Moyo, who called in sick and travelled to a voting station in another township to vote for the opposition. He was quickly called into headquarters where he was told he had been spotted voting and was accused of being a traitor. Moyo returned home one evening and was ambushed by a posse of men who beat and tortured him mercilessly and left him for dead in a ditch. The torture included mutilating his genitals with a knife.
"I crawled home and when my children opened the door they screamed and screamed and screamed," Moyo told me calmly. (I could almost hear their cries as he spoke.)
Moyo also unabashedly, and unexpectedly, handed over a photograph taken at a later date of his mutilated genitals. This man's perseverance and will to live is astounding.
Moyo was forced to flee the country he loved. After a journey that deserves more than the few words I can offer here, he arrived in Â鶹´«Ã½Ó³»after spending several years in a refugee camp in South Africa. One of the few belongings Moyo took with him was a slim package of medical records detailing his diagnosis of HIV in 2003 and following treatment. During our interview Moyo pulled out the papers to show me.
Moyo credits the team at the John Ruedy Immunodeficiency Clinic for his current good health-both physical and emotional.
He explained that while medical doctors and nurses at the clinic work to heal his body, psychiatrists and counsellors help heal his mind, which is still full of visions most Canadians have only ever seen in their worst nightmares.
"There is everything I need right here, so I don't have to leave the building," Moyo told me. Which is a good thing on a cold December day.
In Africa, when he was initially diagnosed with HIV, the only medication he was given was an antibiotic. Later, in South Africa, Moyo received HIV medication that caused his body to waste away. Thanks to his treatment at the John Ruedy Clinic, Moyo is optimistic about his future.
"They offer the best treatment in the world for people living with HIV," says Moyo. "AIDS is gone and today there are only people living with HIV, and we can live to be 100."
Moyo works with other African refugees who are HIV positive through the Afro-Canadian Positive Network of B.C., which he helped form with the support of staff from the clinic. The network brings together HIV-positive men and women from across Africa. Their commonality is the English language.
As he sat in a chair in a cramped office at the clinic Monday morning, the visible scars on Moyo's head were highlighted by the sun streaming through the window. He ran a hand over the bald spots as he spoke.
"Some of these refugees have seen things even worse than I have," he said. "It's good we can come together now, here in Vancouver."
Twitter: @sthomas10
