As noted a few days ago, after the demonstration to protest racism and police brutality in the US last Sunday, many people wondered that the large crowd had ignored the precautions (DK) against the coronavirus. Regarding the debate about the risk (DK) of the infection spreading at the demonstration, Bwalya Søren, the spokesperson for Black Lives Matter Denmark, which arranged the protest, asked, “Are you so afraid that black people can get a little bit of rights?”

Since then, other questions have arisen about  BLM Denmark’s management of the demonstration. When Sørensen spoke to the 15,000 people gathered in front of the Parliament building, she told the white attendees to move out of the way and let the blacks stand in front of the banners. 

Before the event, BLM Denmark had posted a series of rules on Instagram about “Protest etiquette for white folks” (DK). The rules state that whites should not talk to the press, they should not start chants, and they should not join in certain chants. For example, they should not chant, “I can’t breathe” because “Being choked and shot are not things happening to white folks in the same way as they are to black folks. . . . The black power fist falls under this too. These . . . are not for appropriation.”

Defense of segregation and unreported fundraising 

Making special rules for whites at the demonstration strikes some people as discriminatory itself and against the basic principle of the protest for equality. “I’m deeply shocked, and I think it is very un-Danish,” said journalist Jeppe Søe. “It argues against its own cause.” When asked about that reaction, Bwalya Sørensen responded, “If you are dissatisfied . . . you should stay home. It is white supremacy.” 

Later, in a radio interview, Sørensen was asked about BLM’s fundraising for the event. She acknowledged that the organization had not registered the money it had collected (DK) with the Danish Fundraising Board, that donors could not see what the money was being used for, and that the collection was therefore illegal. “But should I stop a movement to protest about George Floyd because I have to follow some rules?” she said. “Have you heard of civil disobedience?” she asked the interviewer and emphasized that the Danish government must say something about the killings in the USA.

Systematic white supremacy

Problems also arose planning a demonstration (DK) on Tuesday in Aalborg, a smaller city in northern Jutland. Other groups had arranged a demonstration to support the one planned by BLM – high school students, day-care staff students and the local office of Amnesty International. BLM objected that these groups planned to hold a demonstration in Aalborg on the same day that BLM wanted to hold one. Amnesty had already received permission to hold the demonstration before it knew that BLM also wanted to on the same day. It invited  Sørensen to speak at its demonstration and asked whether BLM could postpone its demonstration until the day after. 

Sørensen was insulted by the offer: “And so white people will drive us away. It is ‘white supremacy,’ racism and misogynistic garbage, to put it mildly. . . . That man is racist,” she said of Hans Hyttel, the Aalborg representative of Amnesty International. When asked what Hyttel had said, Sørensen replied, “Why should all of you at B.T. [the newspaper] be white? How many people of color are employed there? Why should you kidnap the agenda?”

Amnesty International canceled its planned demonstration and expressed its support for the BLM demonstration.

A passionate activist

Bwalya Sørensen, who is 53, came to Denmark from Zambia 34 years ago. She has been active in protest movements (DK) since the refugee and migrant crisis in Europe in 2015. She has campaigned for various causes, for example against poverty, for LGBT+ rights and in the debate on rape laws. Perhaps the first time she came to prominence was in a demonstration against the anti-Islamist Pegida organization at a train station in 2017. She can be seen protesting against the “Nazi pigs!” in this video (DK).