For Sulieman*, a 21-year-old nonbinary person living in Kaduna, Nigeria, Pose was the best thing they had ever seen on television. “The plot was sad, but amid all their struggles and heartbreak, you could see that they were part of a larger community. And in their darkest moments, they turned to each other for support,” they said. "You could see how free and alive they were at the balls. I wanted to feel that freedom too, to feel like I was part of something bigger than myself.”
For queer people across the world, seeing LGBTQ folks celebrating themselves onscreen in Pose was revolutionary. The show portrays a fictionalized version of New York’s queer, BIPOC-led ballroom culture that burgeoned in the 1980s. Drag balls have existed in America since the 1800s, but came to wider popularity in the ‘80s and ‘90s, At the balls, individuals or “houses” compete in different categories, dressing in drag and Vogueing. Sulieman longs for a similar scene in Nigeria, where being queer is illegal. It turns out, that scene exists.
Nigeria is one of many African countries that operates around legal traditions and Christian doctrines imported and enforced by British colonial administrators. In Nigeria, the “public show of [a] same sex amorous relationship” is a crime punishable by up to 14 years imprisonment. It is also a crime to dress in clothes not typically associated with one’s assumed gender. Because of Nigeria’s complicated relationship with colonial laws, homophobia and transphobia often goes unchallenged, leaving the misconceived notion that queerness is against our culture. This ongoing oppression necessitated a world where members of the queer community could be together, give meaning to their identity, and experience the freedom and nonconformity that came with it — which is where Nigeria’s secret ballroom culture, an underground world where queer people can freely be themselves like in Pose, comes in.
Nigeria’s ballroom culture has existed for years, but has more recently been driven further underground thanks to stricter anti-gay laws. For Nigerians, ballroom culture challenges social structures and demonstrates the queer utopia they hope can one day exist out in the open.
Queer Nigerians remember the country’s ballroom scene of the early 2000s as an easy way for queer folks to connect with each other. In these spaces, queer folks were free to express themselves through dance and fashion. Men wore dresses, heavy makeup, wigs, and accessories that accentuated their femininity. It was the best way to defy the strict gender-roles enforced by Nigerian society. Dennis Macaulay, a gay man in his mid-30s, who was active in the ballroom scene as a university student in Portharcourt, Nigeria, talks about attending these underground parties and balls, which he described as glamorous.
“When I first came to the realization of my identity as a gay man, I started to make other queer friends who then introduced me to ballroom culture. The first time they told me about a party for queer folks, I was really terrified,” he says. “I thought about what would happen if the police raided the venue, but I went regardless. I went to balls at least three or four times a month. Sometimes my friends and I would attend one ball on Friday night, another on Saturday night and a different one on Sunday evening. Eventually I began to MC some of the balls.”
Macaulay recalls “electrifying” balls with “legendary” drama. He names the Kalagbor girls and I.B. dollar among the fiercest of the competitors. They weren’t always held in fancy places, Macaulay says, often happening in non-air conditioned hotels.
Despite what seemed like rivalry between houses, the balls fostered a sense of community and family for queer Nigerians who often had little support or acceptance from their biological families. “I had been to parties before with my brothers, but the ball was the first space I partied in where I felt free to be myself. After a long night of partying, you may end up sharing a hotel room with one or two people and that would be the beginning of a strong friendship. When we had to leave in the morning to our regular lives, there was always a feeling of loss and questions of ‘when next?’ hanging in the air,” says Macaulay.
The balls were also a celebration of what it meant to be queer and Nigerian, Macaulay says. “The first time I attended a ball, I saw two men I knew from church,” he remembers. “It was such a pleasant surprise. I could dance how I wanted and with whomever without fear or anxiety. These were things I could never do in ‘conventional’ spaces at the time.”
“The best thing about [the balls],” Macaulay continues, “was the fact that you were with your people in a place where you did not have to perform heterosexuality or conform to gender norms and that is what community is.”
By 2005 the underground ballroom scene had evolved into something more radical. Various organizations that catered to the needs of queer folks and sexual minorities began to spring up and balls served to provide aid to the queer community through HIV-related support, medical care, therapy, and support in cases of human right violations.
Yomi Aka, a human rights advocate who works with an organization that caters to the needs of queer folks, started dancing at underground balls in 2004 as part of a group he formed with two other friends called DC3 — a play on their love for Destiny’s Child. “My friends and I heard about a party in Okoko, Lagos and we just went there and told the organizers we had something to show them. I attended a lot of balls as DC3 became a major attraction at the parties; people wanted to watch us perform and our performances brought a surge of individuals who wanted to be part of DC3” he says. “So when the DC3 group disbanded, I formed a larger group called Uncensored.”
Aka highlights the balls as more than just parties, but a means to raise money to tackle issues affecting the queer community. “The balls became a form of outreach and advocacy. Different organizations would invite Uncensored as guest stars to the balls to draw a crowd, and at the balls they could run HIV/AIDS intervention programs where they educate folks on sexual health and other topics targeted at sexual minorities.”
Using the balls for a larger purpose made Aka feel good — he could express himself and help others at the same time. And, he says, “I would hear testimonies from people saying watching me dance made them feel like they could exist as themselves without shame.”
But behind the glamour and fun was a real threat. Conveying information about the balls was not always easy, and a lot of effort was required to restrict access to the balls to guarantee the safety of the community. “In the early days, they used to sell the tickets to the balls at the venue, but the line-up for the tickets began to attract a lot of attention. We had a few incidents where heterosexual people came into the balls uninvited, and it led to brawls, and everyone had to disperse. Eventually organizers stopped selling tickets at the venues, you had to buy them beforehand from the area cliques and you had to have been referred by one of the queer folks in the clique,” says Macaulay.
Security remains a threat in today’s ballroom scene. In 2014, the Same Sex Marriage Prohibition Act (“SSMPA”) — which expressly prohibits the meetings of gay clubs, societies, and organizations, as well as the direct or indirect public show of “same sex amorous relationship” — was signed as law, and this led to an increase in violence against queer folks all over the country. Before the SSMPA, there were already provisions in Nigeria’s criminal and penal code that banned sexual activities between people of the same gender. The SSMPA, with all the publicity that came with its passing, seemed to embolden homophobic Nigerians to inflict violence on people they perceived as queer.
“When the SSMPA was passed, we no longer had to worry about just the state’s security forces, even our neighbors, coworkers, and friends weaponized the law. So, we went back to concealing and suppressing whatever traits made us targets,” says Macaulay. “It also became difficult to find hotels and bars that were going to take our business and rent out venues to us because they were afraid of what would happen if they were found, and they were not ready to put their business at risk for our sake.”
“There were talks of members of the police force and military personnel witch hunting organizations that served queer people and individuals that affiliated with these organizations. No one wanted to be seen with us, even the people we provided counseling and medication preferred to talk to us on the phone or have us deliver their medication to them because they feared being arrested. Everyone laid low and people stopped showing up for the underground balls and parties,” says Aka.
After the SSMPA was passed, police officers across states in Nigeria started arbitrarily arresting and reportedly extorting money from people they perceived as queer. They raided parties, and arrested and prosecuted people on bogus charges of homosexuality as seen in the publicized case of the Egbeda 57. Consequently, it became increasingly difficult to organize balls and many queer folks were too scared to try. Between 2010 and 2016, the ballroom scene went further underground, and disappeared totally in some states.
Macaulay says, “I think about my time hosting and attending balls with a lot of nostalgia. I wish I could go back to it. Nigeria is a lot different now and I hope that despite the SSMPA there are people out there still brave enough, living their lives and having fun.”
Because of the risks associated with queer spaces, a lot of young queer Nigerians seem unaware of the underground ballroom scene in their states. Fola Francis, an openly trans woman living in Nigeria, first learned of the existence of ballroom in Nigeria in December 2020 from a friend. “I have always wanted to be in spaces like this since I watched [iconic ballroom film] Paris is Burning, but I did not know there were actual ballroom scenes in Lagos. When I found out they existed, I started attending,” she says. “The first time I attended, I thought I was just going to watch but I felt so alive being there. They were celebrating the same characteristics that made society oppress us. I ended up walking the runway category and people applauded my femininity and eccentric nature. There was no reason to hide the most glorious part of my being. On that stage all the dreams and fantasies of who I am, what I could be became real.”
With the help of the internet and social media, the younger generation of queer Nigerians who do know about the ballroom scene are working to revive it and fighting for their right to exist unapologetically. 25-year-old Aaron Ahalu is an artist and rave organizer in the Lagos underground electronic scene. Early this year, he began organizing balls with a collective called the hFactor. When asked about his motivation he says, “It is impossible to go anywhere in Nigeria and find men dancing together, holding themselves affectionately or even sharing a kiss in public. We are not allowed that freedom of expression here. I want to be able to have fun without any restrictions that prevent me from truly expressing who I am. Watching ballroom culture in [shows] like Pose and videos on YouTube made me thirsty for that level of freedom and drove me to start organizing mentally, somehow I was able to communicate with the right people and we had our first ball in July, just a week after pride month”
Ahalu, who has successfully organized three balls in Lagos, says the decision to do so was easy. “The turnout for the first ball was unbelievable: We had 150 category registrations and over 200 guests,” he says. “It is easy to want to organize anything for queer folks here. Every single time you meet a queer sibling it is just love and good vibes. I just wanted to create a safe space for all the queers to come and be at peace; the hFactor balls achieved that in a way.”
Today, many transgender and gender nonconforming people in Nigeria are beginning to accept themselves and dissociate from the stereotypes and stigma associated with transness and nonconformity in Nigerian society. The balls help them exist as themselves while challenging legislation that prohibit queer expression. Francis says, “It took many years to accept myself as a trans woman. I was always worried about my safety and how society would react to my existence. Attending the balls helped me settle into my identity and I realized nothing else matters if I refuse to accept myself for simply being. Nigeria is a funny place; I could die tomorrow, and I want to die with the knowledge that everyone knows me as a trans woman.”
*Name has been changed for privacy
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