By LEANDRA ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

lrolle@tribunemedia.net

THE Bahamas LGBTI community has no intentions of cancelling 2020 Pride Bahamas events as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to organisers, who said the launch will still take place in October, but under certain guidelines.

Speaking to The Tribune yesterday, Pride Bahamas spokesperson Alexus D’Marco said the events, which initially were set to be hosted in a public forum, will now likely be hosted virtually in view of the COVID-19 social distancing guidelines.

“Due to the COVID-19 restrictions, we are remapping and revamping our plans,” she told The Tribune yesterday. “There won’t be any social gatherings if the protocols are still in place for COVID-19 but Pride Bahamas 2020 will be launched October 5.

“So, COVID-19 has impacted Pride as far as a mass gathering but COVID-19 doesn’t impact us launching Pride Bahamas 2020, which will be done on a virtual programme.”

However, she said the guidelines could potentially change depending on when the government moved the country to phase five of its re-opening, further relaxing COVID-19 restrictions.

She added: “So if at that time, we are at phase five during that particular time, at phase five we will have international people come in who were coming to support the Pride but it’s depending on the phase that we’re at at that particular period.”

Organisers are also in discussions to have the opening event at University of the Bahamas, she said, adding this had not been confirmed. According to Ms D’Marco, the opening will include “a flag-raising ceremony, the history of LGBTI Bahamas community and the way forward.”

“. . .But, that’s probably one of the only social gatherings we will have if we are allowed during that period. But for right now, we’re virtual,” she said.

The events, slated for October 5-10, will be held under the theme “the Rebirth of Pride Bahamas Centering LGBTIQA People in The Bahamas’ Future.”

Ms D’Marco said contrary to popular belief, the events will not be a celebration of decadence, but will serve to educate and create awareness about the marginalised community.

“It’s about education and sensitisation,” she told The Tribune. “That’s originally what Pride Bahamas was about but people originally thought Pride Bahamas was about marching in the streets in (scantily clad) and stuff like that but that’s not what it is about for us and our launch.

“The only parade we had planned was if the church decided to march, we would’ve marched in front of the church and say ‘we are church people too and we have families too.’”

In an effort to create more awareness about those in the community, Ms D’Marco said the organisation is engaging a number of people from different sectors within the country to better inform the public.

She said: “We have different persons from the sector such as the police who will be talking and dialoguing with the police in regard to why the community don’t trust the police and what tools can we use to sensitise police to the violence that most LGBTI people in the Bahamas incur.”

She continued: “So we have the Ministry of Health, we’re engaging them in regards to our health and wellness platform for Pride Bahamas – the health and wellness of LGBTI Bahamians, inclusive of LGBTI persons and our access to justice programme.

“We’ll be talking to some attorneys to find out why there are no legal protections in place for LGBTI Bahamians and what things we can work on together, moving forward. So virtually, all of this stuff will be done through a live and a Zoom platform.”

Despite these new guidelines, the local activist said members in the community are looking forward to attending the highly anticipated event.