Kenya LGBTQ+ community living in fear over anti-gay bill as homophobia in Africa spreads

Like every other queer community on the continent already living in fear, the LGBTQ+ community in Kenya might be the next to be hit with an additional extreme bill.

Following the draconian anti-gay bill passed by the Ugandan parliament on March 21, Kenyan Opposition MP George Peter Kaluma submitted an anti-gay bill to the National Assembly of Kenya, which he called the Family Protection Bill.

“The Kenyan Family Protection Bill proposes a broader range of offences and stiffer penalties against LGBTQ activities,” he tweeted.

Mr Kaluma, who has more than 180,000 followers on Twitter, also tweeted details of the content of the proposed bill, including a decade of imprisonment and the death sentence as its penalties.

Kenyan societies are highly conservative, and a large majority of people hold negative and bigoted views of LGBTQ+ people. Same-sex acts already carry a maximum of 14 years’ imprisonment, or 21 years with defined aggravating circumstances, but at the same time, the government can be quite tolerant of LGBTQ+ individuals, including giving asylum to people from other African countries who are being persecuted.

But in a recent interview with the BBC, Mr Kaluma said he wanted the Kenyan parliament to prohibit everything about homosexuality, revoke refugees’ asylum and drive them away from Kenya.

“The bill will propose a total ban on what the West calls sex-reassignment prescriptions and procedures, and prohibit all activities that promote homosexuality, for example, gay parades, drag shows, wearing the colours, the flags, the emblems of the LGBTQ group,” Mr Kaluma said.

“Across the continent we want to have these laws.

“If they want to sanction Uganda, let them sanction the entirety of Africa.”

Another Kenyan member of parliament, Mohammed Ali, said he doesn’t believe gay Africans exist, claiming homosexuality was a foreign invention the West was imposing on the continent.

“Openly gay Africans are liars seeking visas to the West or money from rights groups,” he told Reuters.

The bill is currently being vetted by a parliamentary committee, which may then refer it to the full chamber for a vote.

More than 30 countries in Africa signed anti-gay legislation criminalising same-sex relationships and gender identities between 2009-2015. Despite the fact that homosexuality has historically existed in many African societies, contemporary attitudes towards homosexuality and LGBTQ+ individuals are often hostile, making Africa the most homophobic continent in the world.

The penalties for homosexuality in Africa are usually long-term prison sentences, while countries like Mauritania, some northern states in Nigeria, parts of Somalia and Yemen carry death penalties, all of which have sharia-based criminal laws.

However, it had seemed like the trend of anti-gay bills in Africa had come to a halt – until the Ugandan parliament decided to revisit the country’s already-existing legislation to add some new laws.

In the wake of this, the topic stirred a surge of homophobic attacks across the entire continent and people asking for capital punishment in a bid to eradicate homosexuality in Africa for good. Ugandan president Yoweri Musevi signed the new legislation into law on May 30 and for the first time, a capital punishment was added to it for what they called “aggravated homosexuality”.

Just like in Uganda, LGBTQ+ individuals are being harassed and threatened in Kenya already.

Joash and his best friend Denis have been targeted and constantly harassed on campus repeatedly.

“We’ve been intimidated and stalked on campus lately. My course mates have even been making jokes and praying for the bill to be passed, saying they can’t wait to pounce on us and beat the spirit of homosexuality out of us,” the 22-year-old college student said.

Jane, a 25-year-old lesbian, recounted how she was harassed by some men when she went to the market a month ago. They touched her inappropriately, and when she tried to resist, she was struck on the face while onlookers did nothing to help her.

And another gay man, Jacob, who lives in the Kenyan capital of Nairobi, said he had lately become scared for his life.

“Just because I’m a femme man, people always stare and jeer at me whenever I go out,” he said.

“I’ve gotten so used to it already, but since the news of [the] Uganda bill, it has gotten pretty violent lately. They don’t stare anymore; they attack me.

“My femme mannerism is enough to convince anyone that I’m gay and an easy target for homophobic attacks.”

Meanwhile, across the continent, similar laws are being introduced in Ghana, South Sudan and Tanzania.

Ghana’s 275 members of parliament recently unanimously passed the Promotion of Appropriate Sexual Rights and Ghanaian Family Values Bill, pushing it closer to being enacted into law. Though less harsh than Uganda’s new law, the bill proposes a three-year prison sentence for anyone who identifies as LGBTQ+ and a 10-year sentence for anyone who promotes homosexuality. Moreover, the bill seeks to withdraw health services from this community, including HIV medication.

And Tanzanian politician Jacqueline Ngonyani said anti-LGBTQ+ legislation would be introduced later this year in order to “control the ongoing moral decay” of the nation.

“If these [homosexual] people increase, this will be the end of [a]generation. This is the same as what drugs do to our youth,” she added.

So why are different African countries proposing anti-LGBTQ+ measures at the same time? Although there are some other additional factors, US evangelical organisations have been influencing African attitudes towards LGBTQ+ people for more than a decade. They are exporting their anti-LGBTQ+ agenda to Africa, cultivating homophobic narratives and shaping legislation and policies.

Jacqueline Nabagesera, a Ugandan LGBTQ+ rights activist, explained that a small group of American evangelicals came to Uganda speaking out against homosexuality.

“They went to parliament and advised them to change the law, went to universities and told them that LGBTQ+ people have a lot of money and are recruiting them into homosexuality, then went to parents and told them the homosexuals are recruiting their children,” she said. Another Christian organisation – FWI (Family Watch International) – is also lobbying in Africa and campaigning against children and young people being given Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE).

Although the new bill has not been passed yet, the National Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission in Kenya reported that the number of attacks against the LGBTQ+ community rose from 78 to 367 within just two months.

“Kenya is my home and I don’t know where else to go,” Jacob said.

“I was born this way and was never given an opportunity to choose my sexuality, it’s depressing I’m being punished for it.”

Daniel Anthony is a Nigerian writer living in Lagos, Nigeria.