Phumi Mtetwa

Phumi Mtetwa, born in November 1973 in KwaThema on the East Rand, 45 km west of Johannesburg, South Africa, has served as a political activist since the 1980s. She focuses on linking economic history, violence, discrimination, and exclusion as crucial elements of the reimagination of rights. Since the beginning of her career, she has believed in ensuring social justice and change for women and other marginalized communities within South Africa, including LGBTQI individuals. She has worked globally, with a focus on Southern Africa and Latin America.

Her upbringing included connections to the anti-apartheid movement, the women’s movement, the LGBTI movement, the feminist movement, and the global anti-capitalist movement, which heavily influenced the trajectory of her career. Growing up in South Africa, she saw the interests of mining companies, the government, and the Chieftains prioritized, while the interests of women and the land were ignored. She may have become inspired to fight for rights by her single mother, who worked long weeks at a telephone manufacturing company to care for Mtetwa and her two older brothers.

When she began her activism in the 1980s, LGBTQI identities were highly judged within South African Society. Mtetwa first came out to her closest comrades, although wasn’t entirely accepted in her identity; her comrades feared she may not take the anti-apartheid movement seriously if she was fighting for other rights at the same time. She would move to Joburg in the early 1990s, where the anonymity of a large city allowed her to experiment with her identity and expression of self. She currently remains in Joburg with her partner, Salimah Valiani, and their six-year-old child, Maleeah.

1985 rent boycott

Phumi Mtetwa’s political career officially began in 1985, when she organized rent boycotts to combat and resist Apartheid. This would be the first of many civil disobedience campaigns for her. She went door-to-door speaking the household elders, encouraging them to not pay the rent on their state-owned housing, which only continued to fund the oppressive system of Apartheid.

The initial purpose of the multi-year boycott was to protest rent increases, although the movement quickly began to include other political aims. At least 50 townships were included in the boycott, and 45 were still actively boycotting by the end of 1990. Residents of these townships claimed that the services they were provided were not worth the exorbitant prices they were forced to pay.

In the case of Soweto, South Africa, a township close to the Johannesburg region, roughly 80% of the Black residents refused to pay rent, water, or electricity. Threats to evict these residents led to violent clashes in 1986 and a crackdown in 1998 that left many without water or electricity. Ultimately, chronic discontent within townships, particularly over the housing, infrastructural development, and rent is what led to such a large movement.

Association with Organizations, Initiatives, and Movements

Phumi Mtetwa has been involved in several organizations, initiatives, and movements throughout her career, besides. the 1985 Rent Boycott. She currently serves as the Regional Director of JASS Southern Africa, otherwise known as Just Associates, where she prioritizes Feminist Popular Education and developing strategies for change and fostering connections globally.

She was also a part of the Health Justice Initiative as an HJI Advisory Group Member, was part of Witwatersrand Technikon, was a former Co-Secretary of the International Lesbian and Gay Association, was involved in mobilizations against the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas, was a Co-Founder of the Masithandane End-Hate Collective, was a member of the Global Black Victory Lab, was involved in the LGBT South-South Dialogue, helped influence LGBTI perspectives in the World Social Forum, was involved in the Our Bodies Our Lives movement of HIV positive women in Malawi, was a member of GLOW, was the executive director of the Lesbian and Gay Equality Project, was involved in the Treatment Action Campaign, was a founding chairperson of the Other Foundation, and co-founded the National Coalition for Gay and Lesbian Equality.

Finally, she has served in numerous broad leadership positions with the AIDS Law Project of South Africa and FEDAEPS from Ecuador.

Awards and recognition

Mtetwa has received numerous awards for her activism and efforts. She won the Feathers’ Award, the Kopano Living Legends Award, and an award by the US coalition the Rising Majority. She has also been recognized as a Social Change Initiative Fellow for her campaigning and activism.

Besides that, she has received various high-profile accolades, positions, and titles for her contributions to LGBTQI activism and socioeconomic justice.

Literature

Phumi Mtetwa has written various books and articles, often focused on racism, economic exclusion, and organizing. This includes Globalization: LGBT Alternatives, a book she co-edited, and her article “Correct the Homophobes.”

Literature mentioning Phumi Mtetwa

Besides the literature she has produced, Phumi Mtetwa has been mentioned in numerous books, including: Women and Bisexuality: A Global Perspective, Routledge Handbook of Queer Development Studies, Warped: Gay Normality and Queer Anti-Capitalism, The Cultural Politics of Female Sexuality in South Africa, Pride: Protest and Celebration, Race in Post-Racial Europe: An Intersectional Analysis, Seeds of New Hope: Pan-African Peace Studies for the 21st Century, and many more.

General timeline of Queer rights during Phumi Mtetwa’s active years

In May 1969, Section 20A was passed, criminalizing all sexual acts between men in which more than two people were present. At this point, sodomy had already been criminalized, and the age of consent for male homosexual practices had been raised from 16-years-old to 19-years-old. This law was intentionally vague. The purpose of this law was to try to crack down on any homosexual relations. Even harsher methods were adopted by the Aversion Project from 1971 to 1989. The Aversion Project targeted members of the South African Defence Force, subjecting them to medical torture to cure them of their homosexuality. The torture methods included chemical castration and electroshock therapy.

While homosexuals were facing increasing discrimination and violence, this allowed them the opportunity to form organizations for community and activism. In 1982, the Gay Association of South Africa was founded. While GASA allowed queer individuals to find safety and comfort in numbers, it was problematic. GASA was a white, “non-political” organization. They refused to condemn apartheid and were expelled from the International Gay and Lesbian Association in 1987.

In 1988, the Gay and Lesbian Organization of Witwatersrand was founded. GLOW was explicitly political and racially inclusive. Glow was strictly Anti-Apartheid and later united with the African National Congress and the United Democratic Front. The African National Congress had publicly committed itself to the removal of all forms of discrimination, including queer rights. In 1990, GLOW held the first South African Pride Parade in Johannesburg.

Because of the increasing visibility and knowledge, increased advocacy was performed for queer rights. In May 1996, the post-apartheid era government adopted the first constitution globally to outlaw discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. However, reality is still not quite so progressive. Jacob-Wort states, “‘I count myself lucky because I live in South Africa, where our constitution, in theory, protects me as a queer person... but the lived experience – particularly of lesbian, trans, and intersex people – is very different.’”

In October and November of 1998, further queer rights advancements were made. The ban on sodomy was overruled and deemed unconstitutional in the case of National Coalition for Gay and Lesbian Equality v. Minister of Justice. The National Coalition for Gay and Lesbian Equality was a primary agent in securing queer rights, formed in 1944. This year also saw the Employment Equity Act 55, which prohibited employment discrimination based on sexual identity and HIV status. Finally, 1998 saw National Coalition for Gay and Lesbian Equality v. Minister of Home and Affairs, securing the same-sex immigrant spouses of South Africans the same legal immigration benefits as heterosexual couples.

In September 2002, same-sex adoption rights were established thanks to the case of Du Toit v. Minister of Welfare and Population development. In March of 2003, same-sex parental rights were established in J and B v. Director General, Department of Home Affairs. This ensured that children of same-sex couples would be legally recognized as their children. These two rulings were incredibly important in ensuring equal treatment of LGBT families.  

In March 2004, the Alteration of Sex Description and Sex Status Act was passed, allowing transgender individuals to change their legally recognized sex. In December 2005, marriage was redefined in the case of Minister of Home Affairs v. Fourie. This case found that South Africa’s Marriage Act was unconstitutional, as it discriminated against homosexual couples. In November 2006, the Civil Union Act was signed into law, and in December 2006, the first legal same-sex marriage was performed.

In December 2010, the South African Gay Pride Flag was unveiled. There have continued to be advancements towards South African queer rights, including the identification of hate-crimes and hate-speech against queer individuals, global recognition and support against hate-crimes and hate-speech, the first openly gay African cabinet member (Lynne Brown), the removal of discrimination against gay men by the South African National Blood Service and the equalization of treatment regardless of sexual orientation, the barring of renowned anti-LGBT pastor Steven Anderson as an “undesirable person”, etc.

Queer individuals still face concerning levels of violence within South Africa. A 2016 study by The Other Foundation found that 500,000+ individuals, who identified largely as men or women, also identify as homosexual, bisexual, or gender non-conforming in South Africa, while 3 million+ claim to present themselves in gender non-conforming ways while in public.

While progressive measures passed easily through the post-apartheid government, the public did not feel the same. The effect of European rule, including their heteronormative and homophobic standpoint, remains. A study conducted by the Williams Institute of South Africa on public opinion found that almost 50% of the population believed that transgender people violated South African cultural traditions, and more than 50% were concerned about their children potentially being exposed to transgender individuals. South Africa is considered a “deeply conservative, hetero-normative” country despite its rather progressive image of politics, with most voters against queer rights. While most of the country may be against queer rights, there is little to nothing that can be done to overturn the rulings. Since its inception, the LGBT movement of South Africa has operated within “socially and politically respectable parameters.”