KWA-THEMA, SOUTH AFRICA: LESBIAN BRUTALLY RAPED AND STONED TO DEATH WITH BRICKS

For Immediate Release

April 27, 2011

Ekurhuleni Pride Organizing Committee (EPOC), the key LGBTI organization in the township of Kwa-Thema, Gauteng, South Africa, and the Coalition of African Lesbians (CAL,) condemn the brutal rape and murder, in cold blood, of a member of EPOC. Noxola Nogwaza is believed to have been murdered in the early hours of Sunday, April 24, 2011.

Last Friday, a friend of mine was going to do some shopping for her daughter at Tuskys Beba Beba in Nairobi town. It was around 7.00 am and a bit chilly so side from her head scarf( she’s Muslim) she had an extra shawl on for the cold. There she was, minding her own business when suddenly she saw a few young women looking very scared ,gathered on the walls of the Tuskys supermarket building; some of them holding a bed sheet as if trying to hide something.

NATIONAL YOUNG WOMEN’S FORUM -WHY THE FORUM

In my musings and crafting of citizenship rights for women in Kenya, I am reminded that the 'personal is political'. This feminist principle that came into being in the 1960s and 1970s has once again come alive in the current Kenyan consitutional debate and specifically on the issue of citizenship. A few days ago, I visited the Immigration Department at Nyayo house to renew my passport. One of my brothers happened to be applying for his passport at the same time.

It is puzzling how the people who are loudest on why abortion should not be allowed in this country are men  - pastors, priests, male politicians and men in the streets who have no clue what it means to be a woman and to be pregnant. People who do not have a uterus! The abortion debate in Kenya is happening at a time when women all over the world, State and non-State actors are taking stock of 15 years after the United Nations Women's Conference in Beijing.

Courtesy The New York Times.