Where: Quezon Memorial Circle (Google map)
When: Saturday, April 21, 2012
Time: 8:00AM to 12:00PM
On April 21, 2012 Filipino lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT), will join the Worldwide LGBT Civil Rights March to call for equal rights for all people and demand respect for human rights!
In the Philippines, simultaneous Civil Rights Marches will be held in Isabela, Bacolod City and in Quezon City, Manila. In Manila, the event will be in Quezon Memorial Circle from 9:00am to 12:00 noon where everyone will march around the memorial circle and gather at the Peace Bell inside the park to collectively celebrate the gains achieved by LGBT groups in the Philippines in pushing forward LGBT rights in mainstream society and to re-affirm our commitment to continue the fight for equal rights of all people regardless of sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI).
The Philippines LGBT Civil Rights March is a call to action to:
• Remind us of the need to address the grave human rights violations against LGBT Filipinos; that victims of these violations must be given justice and that perpetrators must be arrested and punished.
• Respect the sexual and reproductive health and rights of all people regardless of SOGI by the passage of the Reproductive Health bill – House Bill 4244 and Senate bill 2865
• Safeguard the retention of SOGI provisions of Senate Bill 2814. The bill, “the Anti-Ethnic, Racial or Religious Discrimination and Profiling Act,” which aims to penalize all forms of discrimination, has passed third reading in the Senate and is close to being finalized in Congress. The LGBT community is gravely concerned that anti-LGBT forces led by the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) will succeed in removing the SOGI provisions of SB 2814.
• Demand the inclusion of SOGI in the ASEAN Declaration of Human Rights, which is being finalized and will be presented in the ASEAN Plus Summit in November 2012 in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
It is hoped that the April 21 Worldwide LGBT Civil Rights March will impress upon our legislators the urgent need to pass the anti-discrimination law to include the protection of LGBT rights. This will be helped greatly by a large show of numbers of the LGBT community and its supporters this coming Saturday.
It is time to make a stand for the civil and political rights if LGBT persons in the Philippines so April 21, 2012 will be a celebration of LGBT rights and a testament to our continued fight for equal rights.
