‘We’re always treated like trash’

TRANSGENDER Guyanese sex workers Gulliver (Quincy) McEwan and Isabella (Seyon) Persaud say Monday’s ruling on their constitutional challenge, by their Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ), was important for them.

In a statement read during a press conference in Guyana, broadcast live on SASOD (Society Against Sexual Orientation Discrimination) Guyana’s Facebook page, McEwan said they were “very happy.”

Persaud, in her own statement, said the transgender community in Guyana has “always been treated like trash.”

She admitted that it was a hard life for transgender people there. McEwan and Persaud were two of the four litigants who successfully challenged the constitutionality of Guyana’s cross-dressing laws.

The CCJ ruled that Section 153(1)(xlvii) of the Summary Jurisdiction (Offences) Act, was “unconstitutionally vague” and violated the rights of the four Guyanese transgender women.

Trinidadian human-rights attorney Douglas Mendes, SC, who led the case for the four women, said the CCJ’s ruling will be acknowledged as a significant contribution to Caribbean jurisprudence and the need to give due respect to everyone.

At the press conference, SASOD’s managing director Joel Simpson said the ruling was a victory for human rights.

Another member of the women’s and SASOD’s legal team, Nigel Hughes, said what was precedent-setting was the court’s findings on the savings clause which protected colonial laws.

“What the CCJ has done is to severely restrict the application of the savings clause,” he said, adding that no longer will it protect offensive pre-independence legislation.

“This is a significant development in jurisprudence.”

Hughes also said the striking down of section 153 removed the discretion of the police to arrest people for dressing differently.

Simpson said while the CCJ’s ruling was not a “magic bullet” to solve all the problems of equity, it will set the tone for discussions on social and economic problems faced by the LGBTQI community in Guyana. He said the community, particularly the transgender community, faced discrimination in accessing health services and education.

“Discrimination is systematic,” he said, adding that it is SASOD’s hope that the ruling will lead to training and sensitisation of law-enforcement personnel and judicial officers in that country.