A wave of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation is gathering pace across Africa, driven by political opportunism and rising anti-Western sentiment, and fuelled by US far-right groups.
Last week 71 men were arrested in Senegal and charged with “unnatural acts”, said the public prosecutor’s office, under a strict new law that has doubled the maximum prison sentence for same-sex relations to 10 years. It also criminalised the “promotion” of homosexuality, including any public representation or financial support.
Senegal has criminalised same-sex sexual activity since 1966, but hostility towards LGBTQ+ people has “intensified in recent years”, said Human Rights Watch. Since the new law came into force in March, more than 100 people have been charged, including “local celebrities”, said AfricaNews. Senegal is one of several African countries to have introduced or intensified its anti-LGBTQ+ legislation in recent years. Activists say LGBTQ+ people are being “scapegoated by politicians”.
What’s the background?
In 2023, Uganda hosted the first African Inter-Parliamentary Conference on Family Values and Sovereignty. Many argue this forum has “influenced anti-LGBTQ+ laws” across Africa, said The Guardian. The annual gatherings have been endorsed by Family Watch International, a US-based Christian campaign group that “opposes abortion” and sex education.
Later that year, Uganda introduced “one of the world’s harshest anti-LGBTQ laws”, said Africa News with AFP. It included life imprisonment for same-sex sex, and the death penalty for “aggravated homosexuality”, which includes same-sex sex while HIV-positive, or with minors. Uganda “set the tone”, and other countries “followed suit”.
Since then, three neighbouring former French colonies – Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger – have all tightened restrictions on same-sex relations, after being taken over by military juntas in a series of coups. In December 2024, Mali criminalised same-sex relations for the first time. Burkina Faso followed last September, introducing prison terms of up to five years. In February, Niger criminalised same-sex sexual activity for the first time, with same-sex marriage punishable by up to 20 years in prison.
Today, 33 of Africa’s 54 countries criminalise LGBTQ+ people “in some form”, said Human Dignity Trust: more than any other region. In some countries, including Somalia and Mauritania, the punishment is death.
What’s the latest?
In Senegal, which borders Mali, MPs unsuccessfully sought to increase jail terms and penalties for “acts against nature” in 2022 and 2024. But in March this year, after a “wave of arrests over alleged same‑sex relationships”, parliament passed the new law by an “overwhelming majority”, said the BBC. Dismissing international criticism, the government said the legislation “reflected the views of Senegalese people”. But funding from US conservative movements may have helped “precipitate” the law, French-Senegalese expert Marame Kane told The Guardian.
In June, Ghana’s parliament voted to pass “one of Africa’s most draconian anti-LGBTQ bills”, said openDemocracy. Same-sex relations were already criminalised, but this latest version of the bill (first introduced in 2021) would impose prison terms for “promoting” same-sex relations. If signed into law, it would make identifying as LGBTQ+ “punishable by up to three years in prison”.
Days later, Ghana hosted this year’s family values conference, attended by “members of far-right and Christian groups in the Global North”. The conference produced a new African Charter on Family Sovereignty and Values, which encouraged governments to “withdraw from international treaties or funding agreements that promote ‘the LGBT agenda’, abortion and sex education”. Critics warned the charter could “entrench anti-LGBTQ laws across the continent”. Despite protests, lawmakers from 18 of the 20 countries represented voted to approve it.
What’s driving the shift?
The “shift toward more restrictive laws” is being “encouraged by conservative figures” in the US and Europe, said Reuters. It has “gained new momentum since Donald Trump returned to the White House”. Some conference attendees said they “saw an opportunity to promote their agendas under Trump”.
Ugandan people are also “very highly homophobic”, Ugandan activist Agather Atuhaire told AFP. Politicians “want something that is going to put them in their good books”.
LGBTQ+ people are “scapegoats”, one activist told Africa News, used to “deflect attention from thorny subjects” or rising discontent. They are also viewed as a “symbol of Western dominance in Africa”, said Ivorian anthropologist Stephane Ballet Djedje. The new anti-LGBTQ+ laws are linked to rising anti-Western sentiment across former colonies, particularly where military juntas have seized power. In Burkina Faso, the law was “framed as boosting its sovereignty in opposition to the West”, said The Guardian.
“Proponents of so-called African ‘family values’ have long portrayed the issue as a religious and moral concern,” said openDemocracy. But they are “increasingly recasting it as part of Africa’s fight against neo-colonialism”.