The documentary Woubi Chéri was released in 1998.  The topic of the film is the lives of woubis (1), yossis (2),  Travestis and other members of the branché (3) community.  The award-winning documentary was globally featured in various film festivals and documentary platforms. 

Shortly after Woubi Chéri’s release, Barbara emigrated to France. Slowly the energetic drive for the L’association des travestis de Côte d’Ivoire (Travesti Association of Cote d’Ivoire)/ IVTA dwindled down and no more signs of the militant activism were seen. It is speculated that the later generations of “men who have sex with men” (MSM) activism in the context of attracting funding for HIV/AIDS erased all the efforts made by the woubis, a result of the nonprofit industrial complex. 

1)- Woubis are effeminate boys who play the role of women in the relationship

2)- Yossis are the men, the husbands. They can be bisexual and/or married with a family while in a relationship with a woubi.

3)- Branché: a coded, local term used by sexual and gender minorities to describe themselves and one another.

It should also be noted that woubis (and cross dressers or transvestites /travestis) are not automatically assumed to be transgender or specifically claiming the Western terminology. Woubis existed long before any information was available on the internet and social media. Through research and the documentary Woubi Chéri it became quite evident and very clear that the branché community and woubi ascribe to a much larger range of genders and sexualities than the Western binary system. They are gender outlaws, so to speak.