The second Pride Parade in Skopje, the capital of North Macedonia, took place on the 26th of June, under the motto “Outside the Walls”.
After a one-year pause due to the pandemic, this year over a thousand supporters gathered in the capital and, in their own words, protested the oppressive policies, the homophobia and the transphobia, but at the same time, celebrated the hope for a society with greater solidarity and justice.
The high temperatures didn’t prevent the members and the supporters of the LGBTI community to come out and raise their voices in celebration of the differences, love, equality, and freedom.
With flags, banners and music, the Pride started at 10 o’clock at the Zhena Borec Park, and from there, the attendees marched through the city center toward Shkolka Stage in the City Park, where later the festive events took part.
The supporters, among other things, through their banners, sent the message that there will be “no more hiding” and that the “beauty is in the diversity.”
This year, the Skopje Pride Parade was attended by the President Stevo Pendarovski and ministers Radmila Shekerinska, Jagoda Shahpaska, and Mila Carovska.
The Parade’s organizers stressed that in the past period, the pandemic has shown everyone what it’s like to be living within four walls and that everyone has learned how the LGBTI community has been closed and forced to live behind walls, but not by their own choice.
For years members of the LGBTI community had been physically attacked, had been victims of domestic violence and hate speech and threats, butthe public prosecution, the police and other institutions were keeping silent, said Elena Petrovska of the Margins Coalition which is part of the Skopje Pride’s Organizing Board.
“This silence wants to erase us and is inspiring violence against us and that is why we are demanding a substantial change in the procedures for these acts and prosecution for them, just like for any other citizen. We are not citizens of a lower rank. The Pride Month is returning us a little bit in the past, it makes us see what we have achieved, the advancement, and how to continue onward,” Petrovska stressed.
She stated that the Gender Recognition Act must be urgently adopted because “the human rights aren’t debatable and no one is obliged to prove their own humanity in order to be protected by the system.” Petrovska also addressed the right-wing policies and the propaganda with false information, which, she said, want to twist the image of the members of the LGBTI community in the society and to present them as pests in the society.
“The bigger and stronger this propaganda and attacks are, the more our resistance will grow stronger. None of us mustn’t be reduced to ideology, we are human beings that deserve equality and respect. No one and nothing will prevent us in our fight, will not take away our energy and derail us from the road to our freedom, as we have love and power,” said Petrovska.
It is absurd in the 21 century to deny the rights to a normal and dignified life to a citizen, stated Maja Morachanin, a coordinator of the Inter-partisan Parliamentary Group for Promoting the Rights of the LGBT People.
“This is why the message we are sending during the Skopje Pride is to stop the discrimination of the LGBTI people, the hate speech, the hate violence, stigmatization,” said Morachanin.
At Shkolka Stage in the City Park, Marija Kostadinovska, who introduced herself as Ana’s mother, also addressed the attendees and stated that in order for the children to come out from the closet, the parents should also provide help.
“As the poet Mika Antic once has said, love your children even when they are guilty, because life will punish them even when they are not. They are allegedly guilty because they are true to themselves, for being so much independent, because they know who to love and we as parents must allow that for them in order to live this life as they should,” Kostadinovska appealed.
The Pride Parade, which took place in Skopje for the first time in 2019, wa organized by the National Network Against Homophobia and Transphobia.
