Africa
Hundreds attend southern Africa LGBTQ development conference
Activists from Namibia, Botswana among participants
A number of LGBTQ rights groups from across southern Africa participated in a recent conference in Cape Town, South Africa, that focused on how to advance equality in the region against the backdrop of the pandemic.
More than 300 people participated in the conference, titled Kopano, which means “gathering” in Sesotho, the Other Foundation, an NGO that advances equality and freedom in Southern Africa, organized. The themes were rollbacks, resilience, reinvention, reinventing relationships and renewal of connections.
Many of those in attendance acknowledged the harsh realities facing community members that include gender-based violence and other barriers to making a living.
The Namibia Diverse Women’s Association sent 10 representatives to the conference that ended last week.
“Our diversity in representation manifested the comprehension of our national diversity,” it said. “Kopano continues to empower and critically challenge our ways of working.”
“Delegates raised issues such as the importance of collaboration and inclusion in advocacy work in the 2LGBTQIA+ sector,” said Gender DynamiX. “Discussants flagged concerns about businesses and organizations from other sectors engaging in work for their own financial benefit, rather than addressing the underlying problems affecting community members. The current funding system is problematic, as it seeks to profit with the lives of 2LGBTQIA+ people and makes it difficult for smaller organization to get funding.”
Gender DynamiX noted its members “suggested an online toolkit for both business and organizations, setting out how partnerships can help support and sustain the cause without exploiting beneficiaries in the process.”
“Nevertheless, 2SLGBTQIA+ people should also be empowered during these business collaborations, and 2SLGBTQIA+ people in workspaces should use their power to push for the representation and values based on inclusion and equity,” said the group. ” 2SLGBTQIA+ organizations also need to hold themselves accountable. Toxic work environments, internal power-plays, overworking, hierarchal flow of work and lack of compensation undermine the wellbeing of 2SLGBTIA+ activists in organizations.”
Lesbians, Gays and Bisexuals of Botswana (LEGABIBO) also welcomed the conference, and even took note of their visit to Robben Island where former South African President Nelson Mandela spent 18 years in prison.
“We had such an eventful day on Africa Day at the Robben Island Museum,” said LEGABIBO. “This visit was a reminder of how Black people have always had to be resilient in the face of adversity, something that black 2SLGBTQIA+ communities can relate with.”
Kopano organizers also thanked those who attended and paid tribute to activists, especially South African advocate Phumi Mtetwa.
“Thank you all, for making Kopano 2022 a great moment to reconnect and renew our movement,” they said. “As Kopano 2022 came to a close, the southern African 2SLGBTQIA+ activist community gathered in Cape Town paid tribute to our living legend, Phumi Mtetwa. There are a few activists about whom this is truer than Phumi. Her entire being sings, vibrates, reverberates with unbridled love for humanity. Never flinching from dissenting or being critical or questioning but always moved by a great love of justice, fairness, and equality, accompanied by huge doses of laughter and a welcoming smile. She represents for many of us, a bridge over troubled waters and always will. Fearlessly but humbly leading from the front, the side and the rear.”
“To know Phumi is to taste, smell and to touch the society so many of us are struggling for,” added the organizers. “From her work in the National Coalition for Gay and Lesbian Equality (NCGLE) in South Africa, the Equality Project, and in various international organizations and in her personal relations Phumi tirelessly and relentlessly tries to bring everyone on board, sometimes at great cost and sacrifice to herself and her interests. Self-sacrifice is not what she is known to shy away from, giving, sharing and genuinely caring for her comrades, friends and family is what Phumi excels at. Organizing is in her DNA, so she is never satisfied to stop at merely strategic thinking which she has shown herself to be very capable of. We honor you, Phumi Mtetwa, for all that you have done to advance our organizing freedom and wellbeing in southern Africa as 2SLGBTQIA+ people.”
Jholerina Timbo, co-chair of the Transgender Movement of Namibia, was also honored.
Timbo founded Wings to Transcend Namibia in 2015 and was involved in the creation of the Southern African Trans Forum, the International Trans Forum and the African Trans Network. Timbo has also worked with PEPFAR-funded programs and is currently a senior advisor for groups on how they can expand their health programs to better reflect human rights needs.
“She believes that inclusive societies are the key to success for southern Africa,” said the Other Foundation. “If any country needs to show that they care about their people, it should start with the minority. We honor you, Jholerina Timbo, for all that you have done to advance our organizing freedom, and wellbeing in southern Africa as 2SLGBTQIA+ people.”
Daniel Itai is the Washington Blade’s Africa correspondent.
Egypt
Egyptian authorities refuse to allow gay cruise to dock in country
Scarlet Lady earlier this week blocked from visiting Turkey
Egyptian authorities have refused to allow a gay cruise to dock in the country.
The Scarlet Lady, a Virgin Voyages ship that Atlantis Events chartered, was to have docked in Alexandria, a port city on the Mediterranean Sea. The Washington Blade obtained a letter that Atlantis Events President Rich Campbell sent to passengers on Thursday, hours before the cruise was to have arrived.
“Early this morning, we were informed that Scarlet Lady has been denied entry into Egyptian waters and, as a result, will no longer be able to call in Alexandria today,” he wrote.
“I know how much this visit meant to so many of you,” added Campbell. “We successfully sailed a similar itinerary last year, so we were surprised by this unfortunate decision.”
Campbell noted “both the Atlantis and Virgin Voyages teams worked tirelessly to make this call in Alexandria a possibility.”
“This news came as a surprise to all of us, and we’re just as disappointed as you are,” he said.
The 10-day cruise left Athens on July 5. It is scheduled to end in Trieste, Italy, on July 15.
The ship had been scheduled to dock in Kusadasi, a Turkish resort town on the Aegean Sea, and Istanbul earlier this week. Turkish authorities refused to allow it in the country.
Former Tempe, Ariz., Mayor Neil Giuliano, who is an LGBTQ+ Victory Institute board member, is among those on the cruise.
“Just a few hours before arriving in Alexandria, Egypt — a city founded by and named for one of the ancient world’s best-known homosexuals — government authorities rescinded permission for our ship of 2,000 gay men to enter Egypt,” wrote Steve May, who is also on the ship, on Thursday in a Facebook post.
Alexander the Great founded Alexandria in 331 B.C.
“As with Turkey, we have been sent away not because of what we did, but because of who we said we are,” said May. “‘I am what I am’ is too much liberty for some to bear. So it was in the United States as well not long ago, where even I ended up as a convicted homosexual after a military trial in 2001 for saying ‘I am gay.’ This is just a reminder that for all the progress we have made, our freedom is never secure — for any of us, regardless of who or how we love. Back to Europe!”
Discrimination and persecution based on sexual orientation and gender identity is commonplace in Egypt. The Egyptian Football Association, along with the Football Federation Islamic Republic of Iran, objected to playing in the World Cup’s “Pride Match” that took place in Seattle on June 26.
Iran and Egypt on Friday faced off during the World Cup’s “Pride Match” in Seattle.
Iran is among the handful of countries in which consensual same-sex sexual relations remain punishable by death. Discrimination and persecution based on sexual orientation and gender identity is commonplace in Egypt.
Friday’s match coincided with Pride weekend in Seattle. The Egyptian Football Association and the Football Federation Islamic Republic of Iran both objected to playing in the “Pride Match.”
Egypt and Iran tied 1-1.
FIFA, for its part, allowed Pride flags inside the stadium during the match.
“The FIFA World Cup 2026 is an inclusive event that welcomes people from all backgrounds,” a FIFA spokesperson told the Washington Blade in a statement. “Fans of all sexual orientations and gender identities are welcome at matches and events. General statements of human rights, including rainbow flags and other flags representing sexual orientation and gender identity, are permitted under the FIFA World Cup 2026™ Stadium Code of Conduct and may be displayed inside stadiums provided they are used in a manner consistent with the code.”
Human Rights Watch welcomed FIFA’s decision to allow Pride flags inside the stadium. Outright International, a global LGBTQ and intersex rights group, distributed Pride flags in Seattle on Friday, which was Pride Match Day.
“Visibility matters,” said Outright International Executive Director Maria Sjödin. “Pride is now being celebrated in more than 100 countries, including this weekend in Seattle. For many LGBTIQ people, seeing a Pride flag in public is a reminder that they are not alone, and that their rights and dignity are recognized.”
FIFA President Gianni Infantino earlier this year told Die Weltwoche, a Swiss magazine, that “there will be no ‘Pride Match’ at the (FIFA) World Cup.”
“There will be a FIFA World Cup match in Seattle, and on the same day, events organized by external organizations will be taking place in the city,” said Infantino. “But that has nothing to do with the match itself.”
Peter Tatchell, a long-time LGBTQ activist from the U.K. who is director of the Peter Tatchell Foundation, was among those who traveled to Seattle for Friday’s match. Tatchell accused FIFA of not vetting World Cup teams — specifically Iran, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Ghana, Senegal, Qatar, Tunisia, Morocco, Iraq, Uzbekistan, and Algeria — over whether they would allow gay players.
“FIFA is protecting LGBT+ visibility in the stands while failing to protect LGBT+ players on the pitch,” said Tatchell.
South Africa
White House to end PEPFAR funding for South Africa
State Department says country failed to respond to 2025 executive order demands
The Trump-Vance administration will end PEPFAR funding for South Africa.
A State Department spokesperson on Wednesday told the Washington Blade the State Department “will begin a phased drawdown of PEPFAR programming in South Africa, with most programs ending by Sept. 30, 2026, and critical personnel support continuing through March 31, 2027.”
Semafor last week reported South Africa has received more than $8 billion in PEPFAR funding since President George W. Bush created the program to combat the global HIV/AIDS pandemic in 2003.
President Donald Trump on Feb. 7, 2025, issued an executive order that addressed what it described as “egregious actions of the Republic of South Africa.” The State Department spokesperson with whom the Blade spoke noted the directive included five specific requests:
• South African government provides exemptions or alternatives for U.S. companies to Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment laws and other race-based mandates.
• Senior government officials (e.g., president, deputy president, or minister of justice) unequivocally condemn all race-based incitement to violence, including the “Kill the Boer” song, more frequently.
• The South African government prevents the implementation of measures that would allow expropriation without fair compensation and due process under the Expropriation Act of 2024.
• South African Police Service designates rural crime a “priority crime” and increases resources dedicated to high-crime rural areas.
• South Africa refrains from actions that would significantly interfere with the implementation of the refugee program, within the confines of South African law.
“The United States communicated to the government of the Republic of South Africa multiple times at many levels that PEPFAR funding was likely to be terminated in the absence of progress on the five asks,” said the State Department spokesperson.
The State Department spokesperson further noted South Africa is “one of the largest economies in sub-Saharan Africa” and “has funded the vast majority of its own HIV response, estimated at 76 percent of the total, including procurement of all treatment commodities.”
“South Africa will continue to be supported by the Global Fund, including for the introduction and scale up of lenacapavir through Global Fund Resources,” the spokesperson told the Blade.
Lenacapavir is groundbreaking HIV prevention drug that users inject twice a year. Eswatini, which borders South Africa, is among the African countries that have received doses of the drug through PEPFAR.
HIV/AIDS service organizations in the U.S. and around the world have sharply criticized the Trump-Vance administration over plans to not fully fund PEPFAR and to cut domestic HIV/AIDS funding.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio shortly after the current White House took office issued a waiver that allowed PEPFAR and other “life-saving humanitarian assistance” programs to continue to operate during a freeze on nearly all U.S. foreign aid spending. HIV/AIDS service providers around the world with whom the Blade has spoken say PEPFAR cuts and the loss of funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development, which officially closed on July 1, 2025, has severely impacted their work.
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