LGBT+ - The African Mirror

Jan

15

2021

Camaraderie, hope and despair on Ugandan election day

ALICE McCOOL DESPITE a presidential campaign marked by homophobic rhetoric, LGBT+ Ugandans turned out to vote yesterday, with many hoping for change and finding unexpected camaraderie. In the capital Kampala, a ballot officer asked 30-year-old transgender lawyer Noah whether he was male or female when he handed over his identity documents, but fellow voters spoke out to support him and he was allowed to vote. "Voting always surprises me because there is always so much camaraderie. I feel like that there is a threshold of tolerance that Ugandans are capable of. We just need the right language," Noah told the…

May

21

2021

By The African Mirror

Outcast to icon: Peter Tatchell’s 50 years of LGBT+ activism

LGBT+

HUGO GREENHALGH DRIVEN by passion and motivated by justice, veteran activist Peter Tatchell says LGBT+ equality remains elusive despite his 50-year campaign for gay rights in Britain and beyond. In a Netflix documentary that premiered on Thursday, the maverick campaigner said fairness for LGBT+ people from Iran to Zimbabwe was a distant dream and the West had to change, too. "The battle for queer freedom will never end until every LGBT+ person on this planet has respect, dignity and human rights," he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. Tatchell said the fight for rights had stalled in Britain, where the government this month announced…

May

14

2021

By The African Mirror

Fear breeds bravery as LGBT+ South Africans resist ‘war on queerness’

LGBT+

KIM HARRISBERG THREE months ago, Chippa Mohanoe's fiancée was stabbed in the neck and killed in front of their neighbours in South Africa's Sebokeng township. Every day since, Mohanoe had to push past his fear of a repeat punishment for being transgender, hoping a high profile will stifle the homophobia that he says killed his fiancée and at least seven other LGBT+ South Africans in recent months. Fear is making him brave. "I am still here and I don't want to hide, I will make sure the justice system upholds her memory," Mohanoe said outside court after the man accused…

May

11

2021

By The African Mirror

OPINION: LGBT+ refugees should be resettled with their chosen families

LGBT+

SAMUEL RITHOLTZ and REBECCA BUXTON IN the autumn of 2018, a ‘rainbow caravan’ of LGBT+ migrants from central America reached the Mexico-U.S. border, where they applied for asylum. In this group were 30 transgender women who requested asylum together at the border in Tijuana. Though a group, they were treated as individuals: some won their asylum cases, others lost. Such separation is common within the U.S. asylum system, and globally because refugee status is normally decided on an individual basis. Exceptions are made to this rule for families and married couples, where refugee status decisions and resettlement are possible on a group basis. But these…

Apr

29

2021

By The African Mirror

Twitter’s new office in Ghana seen as a snub to LGBT+ people

LGBT+

NITA BHALLA TWITTER Inc's decision to open its first African office in Ghana, citing it as a champion of democracy, is "a slap in the face" for sexual minorities in the country who suffer abuse and persecution, LGBT+ rights campaigners said on Wednesday. The social media giant announced earlier this month that the West African nation was selected because it was a supporter of free speech, online freedom and the Open Internet - values which Twitter said it also advocated for. But LGBT+ rights groups criticised the move, accusing the company of disregarding the plight of LGBT+ people in Ghana, where persecution…

Apr

27

2021

By The African Mirror

Cameroonian LGBT activist champions imprisoned transgender women

LGBT+

CHRISTOPHE VAN DER PERRE and JOSIANE KOUAGHEU COMING from Cameroon where letting it be known that she was a lesbian could lead to prison time, activist and social media influencer Bandy Kiki struggled to adjust to her newfound safety after emigrating to Britain a decade ago. Homosexuality is a criminal offence in Cameroon, punishable by up to five years in prison. "I kept thinking, 'Aren't the police going to show up and arrest everybody?'" she said about gatherings she would attend with members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community in Manchester. "My friends kept saying, 'Kiki, it's…

Apr

23

2021

By The African Mirror

LGBTQIA+ people in South Africa ‘are under siege’

LGBT+

CHRIS MAKHAYE UNTIL recently, Simphiwe Mkhize, 18, was dreaming of a career as a social worker. But that dream has now been shattered after he was forced to quit grade 9 at his school in Tongaat, about 40km north of Durban in KwaZulu-Natal. Mkhize says he often found himself in fights with fellow pupils who were insulting him and calling him names because he is gay. “I couldn’t take it anymore. They often picked on me. Some of the insults I let go, but others I returned and this led to fights,” he said. The abuse from his community in…

Apr

15

2021

By The African Mirror

LGBT persecution on the rise in Cameroon, Human Rights Watch says

LGBT+

CAMEROON security forces have arrested, threatened or assaulted at least 24 people since February in a ramped-up crackdown on lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT+) people, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said yesterday. The rights group said recent documented accounts of abuse, including that of a 17-year old boy, point to an overall rise of police action against LGBT+ people in Cameroon, where same-sex relations are criminalised. Cameroon authorities did not respond to Reuters requests for comments. HRW said it shared its report with Cameroon's justice, and defence ministries, and the head of police. It received no response to a March…

Mar

26

2021

By The African Mirror

FACTBOX-Transgender politicians and government officials around the world

LGBT+

RACHEL SAVAGE RACHEL Levine made history this week as the first openly transgender person confirmed in a top government job by the U.S. Senate, with senators voting 52-48 to approve her appointment as assistant health secretary in Joe Biden's administration. A professor of paediatrics and psychiatry at Penn State College of Medicine, Levine led Pennsylvania's response to coronavirus pandemic as the state's top health official. As LGBT+ rights become more accepted, gay and trans politicians have gained greater prominence in recent years around the world - with Pauline Ngarmpring becoming Thailand's first trans candidate for prime minister last year. Here…

Mar

25

2021

By The African Mirror

U.S. soccer star Rapinoe renews call for gender pay equity in House testimony

LGBT+

AMY TENNERY U.S. women's national soccer team star Megan Rapinoe renewed her call for gender pay equity on Wednesday, appearing before a congressional panel and pledging to "carry this torch" alongside her teammates. Rapinoe told the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, the World Cup winners had exceeded the accomplishments of their male counterparts but received inadequate compensation and playing conditions, two years after she and her teammates filed a landmark gender discrimination lawsuit against U.S. Soccer. U.S. Soccer did not immediately respond to a request for comment. It argued in 2019 that the women's team had been compensated more…