Pride Festival offers a rare view on Congolese sexual minorities

On the occasion of the Pride Festival, the photographer Régis Samba-Kounzi presents an exhibition entitled “Lolendo”. In a series of portraits, he brings sex and gender minorities out of the shadows – people who are marginalised by Congolese society – and denounces both homophobia in Africa and the colonial heritage. Check it out: you will never see things the same way again.

The question of borders, the fate of refugees, and their reception is central to political debate (just look at the recent elections in France). But it is also, and undoubtedly in a much more positive way, a major concern of the voluntary, cultural, and artistic sectors, who refuse to close their eyes to the human tragedy unfolding in Africa and the Middle East, and work to ensure that that part of the world is not forgotten.

This year, the unmissable contemporary art event, the Kunstenfestivaldesarts, has decided to organise its programme around the theme of borders. For its part, the Pride Festival aims to highlight the specific problems encountered by LGBTQI+ refugees (lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, queer, intersex, etc.) in a programme entitled Crossing Borders.

“It’s a theme in relation to which it is very important to position yourself,” explains Camille Pier, project coordinator for the Pride Festival. “There is a lot of work to be done to raise awareness. For example, LGBTQI+ refugees are subject to very specific admissions procedures which don’t necessarily take into account their country of origin. When a refugee comes from a country where homosexuality or transidentity are not punishable by law, they are not considered to be in danger, but this is not true. Not to mention failures in the implementation of some administrative processes due to ignorance and racism, which can have disastrous consequences for people, for example in the case of transgender people.”

This process of raising awareness must also be carried out within the LGBTQI+ community here in Belgium: “As much as we see ourselves as belonging to a discriminated minority, that’s not to say we aren’t ourselves capable of inflicting a form of unconscious discrimination on people in the form of everyday racism.”

No pathos
The Pride Festival presents this message and makes this case through numerous activities: films, workshops, conferences, shows, and two exhibitions, including “Lolendo” (which means “Pride” in Lingala), which can be seen at Bozar following a preview at Bronks, in collaboration with the Massimadi Festival (the LGBT film festival from Africa and its diaspora).

This photographic series by the French-Congolese-Angolan photographer Régis Samba-Kounzi gives a face to the Congolese LGBTQI+ community in a series of portraits taken in Kinshasa. Out in the street, in the daytime or at night, or in the privacy of their homes. Powerful colour images in which the subjects are simply invited to be themselves, to be proud of what they are.

“I wanted direct portraits that would make possible an immediate connection with the viewer, with no pathos or miserabilism. By posing for me, these people showed enormous courage. Some have their faces hidden by request for safety reasons,” explains the photographer who got in touch with them through the voluntary sector but also through friends, connections, and by using the social network.

But Samba-Kounzi’s work is not just about making this marginalised and stigmatised community visible. “Lolendo” is also, and perhaps above all, a call to Africans to re-appropriate this fight and to place homophobia and transphobia in the Congo within their historical context, so as to be able to better understand and combat them.

“What struck me was the isolation in which these people find themselves,” explains Samba-Kounzi. “The feeling of marginalisation and vulnerability to verbal, physical, or psychological aggression is very strong.” Though homosexuality is not officially considered a criminal act in the Democratic Republic of Congo, as in other African countries, stigmatisation and violence towards LGBTQI+ people are commonplace and take place with total impunity, since there are no laws to protect against discrimination based on sexual identity. “It’s not just a matter of facing homophobia at an individual level, but having to fight daily against a system of oppression which includes discrimination in terms of housing, employment, and health.”

Adequate access to healthcare for LGBTQI+ people is a particularly important issue, given that HIV remains one of the most serious health problems in the DRC.

Decolonising the imagination
So how do you change people’s mentalities? “By decolonising their imaginations,” the photographer tells us. In the current African mindset, homosexuality is considered a “vice” imported from the West. The myth persists, encouraged by political and religious leaders, of a pre-colonial Africa in which relations between people of the same sex did not exist.

“Congolese homophobes, and African homophobes in general, use this argument as a way of rejecting homosexuals and stripping them of their African-ness. But it’s homophobia that the colonisers introduced in Africa, not homosexuality. It must be repeated time and time again that homosexuality has always existed in Africa and in every continent,” explains Samba-Kounzi, adding, “Our culture, traditions, and ancestral values of openness were never opposed to homosexuality, on the contrary. It was during the period of slavery and colonisation that a hierarchical theory of human beings was introduced and, therefore, a moral judgement of homosexuality.”

Positioning himself within the more global anti-colonialist movement, Samba-Kounzi invites you to step outside the confines of Western interpretation and to be more receptive to other narratives around the way that the LGBTQI+ community is and has been perceived. Narratives which, leaving Africa aside, should make us Westerners question our own representations of homophobia and its history. Food for thought that is to be found throughout this photographic exhibition. Samba-Kounzi: "I believe art is by definition political and is a strong way to change the world, to give an other vision of society."

> Pride Festival. 3/0 > 21/05, various locations, Brussels
> Lolendo. 12/05 > 13/05, Bronks & 15/05 > 17/05, Bozar, Brussels