Ghana: Drop Charges Against LGBT Rights Defenders hrw.org - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from hrw.org Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
LGBT refugees from South Sudan, Uganda and DR Congo protest to demand protection as refugees
Credit: AFP
When Bijoux Ferrazza realised she was transgender, she took a good look around her. Transgender women are nowhere to be seen in Cameroon. Every once in a while, they make headlines, but it was usually because they have been arrested, beaten up or murdered.
Bijoux weighed her options and concluded she only had one: if she wanted to live publicly as a woman – in other words, if she wanted to survive – she had to leave her country.
She did not want to meet the same fate as Cameroonian social media star Shakiro, who, alongside another transgender woman, was arrested on a charge of homosexuality and sent to prison.