The Guyana LGBTIQ+ Coalition has launched the Guyana Pride Festival 2023, celebrating the International Day against Homophobia, Biphobia and Transphobia (IDAHOBIT) under the global theme “Together Always: Unity in Diversity.”
The Guyana Pride Festival had its inaugural launch in 2017 and has gathered significant traction and public support over the years.
The festival features several events, typically in June annually, where LGBTIQ+ people, allies and supporters participate in visibility, campaigning and entertainment activities to raise awareness of the struggles and resilience of LGBTIQ+ people in Guyana and the Caribbean.
Guyana Pride, also called 592 Pride, is hosted by the Guyana LGBTQ Coalition which is comprised of Guyana Trans United (GTU), Sexualities, Women and Genders (SWAG) and SASOD Guyana. SASOD Guyana is the convenor and secretariat of the Coalition.
Guyana Pride Festival opens on June 1 and runs until June 11 with daily events over the period.
This year’s festival opens with an Inter-Faith Forum on Thursday, June 1, hosted by the head of the Roman Catholic Church in Guyana, Bishop Francis Alleyne, at the Catholic Life Centre on Brickdam. On Friday, June 2, there will be a Pride Games Nite.
The following night, Saturday, June 3, a Pride Party will be held at Magic City Lounge in Newtown Kitty.
On Sunday, June 4, the first-ever Rainbow Paintball Contest will be hosted at the Police Sports Club Ground, Eve Leary. This new event has been added to the Pride calendar in partnership with Kendallz Extreme Sports – a Guyanese-owned, outdoor sports and recreation business.
On that Sunday evening, the Pride Film Nite will be held at the Guyana Marriott Hotel. The Marriott is also a new private sector partner supporting this year’s Pride Festival.
On Monday, June 5, there will be a Rainbow Mixer at World of Cocktails in Kitty. Then on Tuesday, June 6, Pride Stage and Open Mic will be at Flavas Restaurant & Bar in Bourda, where attendees are invited to take the stage and perform in support of equal rights for all people in Guyana.
On Wednesday, June 7, which marks SASOD Guyana’s 20th anniversary, there will be a Pride Symposium, to be held at the Herdmanston Lodge Hotel, which will critically examine the state of LGBTIQ+ rights in Guyana.
As the festival heads into its final weekend, the party will return to Flavas Restaurant & Bar on Thursday, June 8, for Drag Nite – a party promoting and celebrating drag as a contemporary form of performance art.
Then on Friday, June 9, festival goers can head to Kiesha’s Crab Shack in South Ruimveldt for Pride Karaoke.
And then on the afternoon of Saturday, June 10, the Pride Parade, the festival’s most popular event, takes our revelers on a circuitous route around the capital city, starting from Independence Park, popularly known as Parade Ground, and culminating at the Square of the Revolution.
Immediately following the Parade, the Pride Parade After-Party will take place at Cocktails Hotspot in Kingston.
The organisers will bring the curtains down on Guyana Pride 2023 with its first-ever “Taste the Rainbow” Brunch Party which will be held in collaboration with STEM Hospitality on Sunday, June 11.
The 2023 Festival is being held under the theme “Decriminalise Sex Guyana!” The theme draws attention to the stain that Guyana is now part of a minority of six countries in the Caribbean that still criminalise same-sex intimacy.
“These laws are a relic of British colonialism and have long been repealed by parliaments in the United Kingdom and the Bahamas, and struck down as unconstitutional by Caribbean courts in independent CARICOM countries, such as Belize, Trinidad and Tobago, Antigua and Barbuda, St. Kitts and Nevis, and most recently, Barbados,” SASOD said in a statement.
