Phumi Mtetwa

Biography

"humi was a youth anti-apartheid activist in the 1980s and an early member of the Gay and Lesbian Organisation of the Witwatersrand in South Africa. She co-founded the National Coalition for Gay and Lesbian Equality and she met with former President Nelson Mandela in 1996 to represent the Coalition in its efforts to secure constitutional protection of equality for LGBTI people. Phumi was manager of the AIDS Law Project (now Section27) from 1994 to 2000, and served as Co-Secretary General of the International Lesbian and Gay Association between 1999 and 2001. She spent over eight years living in Ecuador and was active on several South American LGBTI forums. She then returned to South Africa and served as Director of the Lesbian and Gay Equality Project until 2011. At the end of 2011, she became the first Activist in Residence scholar of Fahamu, a pan-African movement working on social justice issues. Phumi resigned from the Board of the Other Foundation in June 2014, after years of helping to establish the vision and support for the foundation, and serving as its founding chairperson. It was a hard but necessary decision. "