South African politicians are targeting President Thabo Mbeki over his sluggish response to Aids with hard-hitting campaigns that relentlessly remind voters that the disease kills 600 citizens every day.

Mbeki's African National Congress government started distributing free anti-Aids drugs at a handful of state hospitals in the past week, but opposition parties were quick to point out that the long-overdue move was curiously close to the April 14 elections.

"For ten years, the ANC has had the power to create jobs, to fight crime and to treat HIV and Aids. But in all that time, it failed to deliver," main opposition leader Tony Leon said.

The cabinet approved a national treatment plan in November 2003 but has since failed to keep its promise to provide free anti-retrovirals to more than 50 000 people by the end of March.

'In all that time, it failed to deliver'

"Across the nation, the ANC has broken its promises on Aids," said Leon, leader of the Democratic Alliance whose platform with the Zulu-dominated Inkatha Freedom Party calls for more action to combat Aids.

Aids ranks alongside crime, poverty and unemployment as a hot election issue but opposition parties have not come up with any fresh ideas on fighting the pandemic other than providing free anti-retrovirals.

South Africa has one of the highest Aids rates in the world with an estimated 5,3 million people, or one in nine South Africans, living with HIV or Aids.

The Aids lobby group, Treatment Action Campaign, says about 600 people die of Aids in South Africa every day, making it the country's biggest killer.

Not surprising then, that the government's failure to mount a quick response to Aids has become a burning issue in the run-up to the elections which coincide with the 10th anniversary of the end of apartheid.

'Things will start getting easier for us now'

Just four years ago, Mbeki infamously questioned whether there was a link between HIV and Aids and labelled anti-retrovirals "dangerous" after which he clammed up.

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