Wasn’t Pride in May? Why United by Pride Still Matters

United by Pride Returns for Its 4th Year, Bringing Communities Together

Pavlos Christou

08 Sep 2025

This September, a grassroots march returns for its fourth year to bring LGBTQIA+ communities together, proving Pride is more than a parade, it’s protest, unity, and collective action.

So, “Wasn’t Pride in May?” That’s the question many people ask when they see another march being announced. And it’s a fair question, but the answer says a lot about why Pride exists in the first place, and why we need spaces that look, feel, and act differently.

United by Pride, returning for its fourth year on Saturday, September 27, is not just another event on the calendar. It was born out of a grassroots need: to create a Pride that speaks to the lived realities of LGBTQIA+ people across Cyprus, and across the divide. Where other events may focus more on visibility through polished parades, United by Pride puts its energy into protest, solidarity, and reclaiming Pride as a people-led movement.

This distinction matters. In a time when LGBTQIA+ rights are being challenged globally and progress feels fragile, a grassroots Pride reminds us that visibility alone is not enough. We also need spaces that hold protest and celebration together, where joy and resistance go hand in hand, and where the very act of gathering across checkpoints and communities becomes a statement in itself.

This year, United by Pride takes on that mission with parallel marches from Eleftheria Square and Kugulu Park in Nicosia, converging at the Ledra Palace buffer zone. It is not just a symbolic gesture but a deliberate act of unity in a place defined by division. To march together here is to insist that LGBTQIA+ lives and struggles cannot be contained by borders, politics, or walls.

The initiative also serves as a reminder of Pride’s radical roots. Pride was never meant to be a once-a-year festival that fits neatly into a city’s cultural calendar. It was, and still is, a protest born from the refusal to accept silence, marginalization, and erasure. United by Pride reclaims that history, centering the voices and bodies of LGBTQIA+ people themselves, and reminding us that collective action is still the most powerful tool we have.

So yes, Cyprus Pride may have been celebrated in May, and it was beautiful and equally important. But Pride is not a single date or a single event. It is ongoing, it is plural, and it belongs to everyone who continues to fight for equality, safety, and dignity. On September 27, when United by Pride marches again, it will show that Pride is strongest when it is grassroots, when it is inclusive, and when it is united.

United by pride is organized with the support of QUEER COLLECTIVE CY, KUIR KIBRIS, CARABINER and AFRICAN LGBTIQ CYPRUS.