Tunisia ‘queer film festival’ seeks to make a difference

Twelve short and medium-length films produced in Tunisia and across the Middle East and North Africa are being shown at the “Mawjoudin Queer Film Festival” that opened Monday.

The four-day event is organised by Mawjoudin, Arabic for “We Exist”, a Tunisian non-governmental association which defends the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.

It is the first event of its kind in Tunisia and the organisers say the “festival conceives of itself as audacious”.

The films “speak of sexuality, identity and gender affiliation,” said Senda Ben Jebara, a member of Mawjoudin, a group founded in 2014.

“Through this festival we would like to give a space to queer people in general in order to escape a bit from social pressure, and also to identify with something, find a means to express ourselves,” she said.

“We are trying to fight not only in the courts but through art.”

Ben Jebara said the messages which the festival would like to get across are that “we are different but we exist and differences are welcome”.

Mourad, a 21-year-old festival-goer, said the film fest “helps to strengthen the LGBT community and brings together people who are considered different”.

Gay rights activists have emerged from the shadows in Tunisia since the revolution in 2011, but their position remains precarious in the North African country’s conservative Muslim society.

Article 230 of the penal code includes a punishment of up to three years in prison for homosexuality and young men are regularly detained and prosecuted.

An online radio station catering for the LGBT community, believed to be the first of its kind in the Arab world, started broadcasting in Tunisia on December 18.

But Shams Rad, which was set up by LGBT rights group Shams and promotes “dignity, equality”, is now facing legal procedures aimed at shutting it down.