GaySA Radio celebrating 3rd birthday in aid of charity

This October will be three years since GaySA Radio was officially launched. To celebrate, they will be hosting a 3-year-old themed party at Pretoria Pride, with the proceeds benefiting the Cotlands children’s charity.

The station started in 2015 with just the four founders, who were soon joined by several volunteers who dedicated their time and effort to enable the first South African internet radio station to broadcast LGBTQ+ content to Africa and the world.

“While it was staffed mainly by volunteers in the first two years, a small permanent team was appointed at the beginning of this year to give more stability to the content delivery and to contribute to real and lasting change,” said station manager Hendrik Baird.

GaySA Radio most famously made an impact on LGBTQ+ people in South Africa by spearheading the campaign to keep gay-hating pastor Steven Anderson and his cronies out of South Africa (and Botswana, and Jamaica!) Their ongoing efforts against Anderson’s acolyte Oscar Bougard also recently contributed to his being found guilty of hate speech, with a suspended sentence.

“And so the third birthday celebration month of October is an excellent time to celebrate GaySA Radio’s successes and introduce some improvements to better serve LGBTQ+ people,” said Baird. These include a longer curated content day on the live stream, more podcast series, and ensuring that the music played is exclusively by LGBTQ+ artists, allies and icons.

To kick off the birthday celebrations, which will last throughout October, you are invited to attend their birthday party on 6 October at Pretoria Pride. The fun starts at 10 am as LGBTQ+ people with children will have some fun with Magic Man Hendini. This colourful magic show will be followed by rainbow cake and something to drink. Photographer Rudi will be on hand to capture your party pics.

There is space for about 100 people at the party, so it’s crucial that you to RSVP. Simply email your name, cell number and number of people to info@gaysaradio.co.za. GaySA Radio has asked that all guests bring an educational toy suitable for a three-year-old or R150 to the event (there will be a credit card machine on the day to easily make a donation).

If you are not attending, you can still support the children at Cotlands by depositing the R150 donation into the GaySA Radio Thando NPO business cheque account at FNB, number 6269 6183 624 (Ref: Cotlands + your name).

Once the party celebrations have concluded at around 12 noon, the GaySA Radio stall will join forces with Rasputin to become a chill lounge for the rest of the day, with a selfie station. The aim is to photograph every single person who attends Pretoria Pride.

To listen and for more information, go to gaysaradio.co.za and follow GaySA Radio on social media.