Campus ‘Love House’ is a safe space for queer Nigerian students

‘Nothing but love and kindness foster the bonds which bind us, a safe space.’

In a country where supporting gay rights is a crime, a group of young queer university students in Ibadan, Nigeria, are defying societal norms, navigating danger, discrimination, and secrecy as they forge powerful friendships and build a community around their shared identity. Pseudonyms are used in this article to shield students from harm.

By Zara Oluwasanmi and Tomide Odu

The first time Janet met Ayo, the latter played a Todrick Hall song in a banking hall, hoping to catch Janet’s attention. And like drawing a moth to a flame, it worked.

“It was on Grindr that I met Ayo again,” Janet says. ”I was elated, mostly because I was now to be among people who would certainly understand the loneliness.”

Before gaining admission into the University of Ibadan in 2019, Janet, bold and relentless about his identity, had attracted unwanted attention that led to him being kidnapped and kitoed due to his Facebook presence.

Despite the ordeal leaving him traumatised, it strengthened his resolve to continue to be himself and to share his thoughts on queer identity, drawing shock and awe from students and lecturers alike. Meeting Ayo, Janet says, was pivotal to their student experience.

“I was added to a Whatsapp group that same day. We were a total of five members, students who were equally as lonely as I was and had met each other through stereotyping and Grindr,” Janet says. “We were called Love House. It’s a community where nothing but love and kindness foster the bonds which bind us, a safe space. On the first physical gathering I attended, I still remember the warmth that tugged at my stomach, meeting these people who would go on to shape my experience as a student on this campus.”

In communities that have had to fight for their right to belong and express themselves, the shift from tight-knit to individualist societies has made it harder for people to foster and maintain connections, especially in a country where queer people can be penalised and put in prison for operating in gay clubs or unions of any sort.

At the University of Ibadan, Love House began to grow as a haven for lonely people seeking the warmth of community. Its members hosted meetings in their hostels and different locations within the university. Gradually, by word of mouth, more members started to pour in. People who craved true community and friendship began to find each other and built solid relationships, many of which still thrive today even after some members have graduated and moved to several locations worldwide.

Before joining Love house, Temi had trouble making genuine friendships. Being a freshman and navigating his queer identity as a gay man in Ibadan, he gradually realised that he was surrounded by people who were different than he was. He would not find acceptance or compassion here, not with the members of the Christian fellowship he joined or his classmates.

“I came out to a couple of them, and they mocked me, after which they decided it was prayers I needed,” Temi says. “And I tried to do just that. But the more I immersed myself in church activities, the more empty I felt. It lacked substance.”

Temi did the next best thing any young queer person would do: sign up on Grindr. After a string of disappointing hookups, he met Ebube and bonded over the struggles of being queer in the same place.

Ebube’s acceptance of their own trans identity was eventually catalysed by interacting with other queer people in a familiar setting. For Janet, Temi, and Ebube, the freedom to talk about their feelings and thoughts within Love House has been instrumental in unlearning cis-hetero-patriarchal ideas of gender identities and trans-exclusive politics.

“You learn so much when you can argue healthily about issues and old notions can be challenged,” Janet says.

This was especially important during the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown. The contrast between the near-bliss of having a community to share time with and being cooped up in the house with family was jarring for them, but social media became an invaluable tool.

“I didn’t want to be around my old friends anymore. They were so homophobic I couldn’t even tell them what I was going through,” Blessing*, another member of Love House says.

Blessing had been groomed and assaulted by a distant relative shortly before meeting Ebube on Twitter. Months after opening up to Ebube about their ordeal and spending time with the community, they felt lighter and happier.

“In many ways, they began to feel more like family. I could finally talk about crushes and things I was doing without switching pronouns or going silent. I didn’t know I didn’t have to feel shame all the time. I no longer had to laugh off slurs about my femininity. I used to be depressed all the time.”

Art, fashion, film, and dance have united and brought LGBTQ+ persons together for decades. At the University of Ibadan, the arts scene has provided a means for queer people to interact and express their individuality in a communal setting.

Ebube and Temi would write and share their poetry and short stories with group members; they needed to do this in the liminality of this space, as their work often involved themes of queerness and sexuality, themes that would have been discarded or invited vitriol. Ebube has since gone on to be published in various magazines, and Temi has continued harnessing his skill and is writing a novel.

Aside from being worried about constant surveillance and nosey people, one of the problems Love House faced was a scarcity of places to meet.

“We couldn’t always use our hostels, and we thought about renting a place together, but then the pandemic happened, and we couldn’t raise the money, so we had to abandon these plans,” Blessing says.

These issues have not overwhelmed the beauty of seeing young queer people experience love and safety of some sort, according to Temi. “It was important that we got to experience first kisses and first loves in that space. The sleepovers were also a good place to decompress, laugh and experience joy. Before Love House, I didn’t know I could be in a place with so many people like me at the same time. That was refreshing.”

For Ebube, being able to build organic relationships was important to their journey as a younger queer person.

“Love House was more than a place for us to hook up; it was nice to have platonic relationships and learn to open up to friends, messy love triangles notwithstanding. Love House made me who I am. Sometimes there was friction, but I guess it happens when you’re young and experiencing these things for the first time.”

Janet agrees, “One lesson I’ve learnt is that shared identity doesn’t always mean we’re always going to get along. Relationships aren’t always perfect, but it’s good to have space to grow.”

Co-author Zara Oluwasanmi is a 23-year-old, agender artist/creative. Their works seek to explore the otherness that exists in queerness and womanhood. When Zara isn’t contemplating the imbalance of the world you may find them making something, cooking delicious food or tweeting @zara4prez .

Co-author Tomide Odu is a Nigerian writer from Ibadan who writes about culture, sex an& sexuality, being a young person and existing in the world. They have been published in Kenga Magazine and can be found on Twitter/X @tomideprime.

This story was first published on Minority Africa and appears with permission in this publication.