Melanie Nathan, March 02, 2025
Writing this post which is the short version of the PDF attached at the end, serves the conclusion, that on this day Africa and the protection environments of the world have failed Africa's LGBTQI community. There is nowhere to go. It is time for drastic measures that if pursued with care and funding are likely sensible. What is drastic is finally taking a different more productive course. What follows is an extreme cryptic summary of a complex milieu, which I will be detailing in a more extensively in the near future. I. THE ROOT CAUSES: of LGBTQI+ Forced Displacement: Criminalization
i. Colonization impacting culture and criminalization: see details in attached PDF PLUS
ii. Christian Fundamentalism: The direct influence of American evangelical groups: see details in attached PDF PLUS
iii. Islam and Jihadist groups: see details in attached PDF
II. THE IMPACT:
i. All of this has contributed to stringent societal taboos against homosexuality and in almost every African country, with a demonization that results in ostracization and extreme violence from state and non-state actors, alike, to include family, friends, neighbors, religious leaders, professions etc. and all this further licensed by the criminalizing laws, whether enforced or not.
Here is the Afrobarometer’s assessment of tolerance levels when it comes to homosexuality in Africa, by country:
On average across 39 countries, at least eight in 10 Africans express tolerant attitudes toward people of different ethnicities (89%), different religions (85%), different political affiliations (82%), and different nationalities (80%). By extreme contrast only one-fourth (24%) say the same about people in same-sex relationships.
One can view the homophobic reactions to LGBTI+ people country-by-country through the below graphic list of some examples. Also one can note the level of xenophobia by comparison on a country-by-country basis. (the graph in PDF)
ii. Country Conditions are dangerous for LGBTQI+ people, with no safe place anywhere in one’s own country: The resulting discrimination, persecution and violence makes it impossible for LGBTQI+ people to live safely in their own countries, whether exposed or not (outed) as LGBTQI+, suspected, perceived, or imputed as such, to include their allies, advocates and even neutral journalists who may be seen as supporters merely due to factual reporting. If not yet exposed, such exposure is a minute away for each and every individual. A myriad of factors contribute to these dangers – such as communal way of living, the impact of banishment, all of which are expanded upon in my country conditions reporting for asylum seekers.
iii. The Harms to which LGBTQI+ People in general are subject at the hands of state and non-state actors in most African countries that cause them to flee: Include mob violence, vigilante justice, beatings, torture, kidnapping, arbitrary arrest, unlawful detention, forced anal exams, disappearances, unjust criminalizing laws with lengthy jails terms that may include life or the death sentence, killings, Sharia law’s floggings and stoning, honor killings, sexual assault and torture, so called "corrective rape", blackmail, extortion, reparative therapy (starvation), banishment (social death), firings, evictions, expulsions, refusal of services such as medical services, trauma informed psycho-social services, alienation from the justice system to include being seen as perpetrator when in fact a victim.
iv. Forced Displacement: All of this results ultimately in forced displacement: When LGBTQI+ Africans are forced to flee their homes, there is generally no safe place within their own countries. They do not have the protection of their governments who see them as miscreants and criminals. Hence they are forced to flee their own countries. In general they have few to no paths, no resources and no one to trust who can provide guidance or support.
Many Africans from over 20 countries on the continent reach out to African Human Rights Coalition, where we provide guidance, resource information and humanitarian services, as a trusted offshore human rights organization dedicated to this milieu. Many do not trust local human rights organizations based on reports of corruption, and in many cases also because of the dangers presented to any human rights group working in these environments, resulting in compromise, extensive marginalization and few durable solutions. Essentially there is nowhere to turn.
v. Flight and Protection options: Besides the issue of immediate triage to those fleeing, and the issues of interim shelter, food and medicine, is the daunting question of where to go to receive long term protection and durable solutions.
For most of Africa’s LGBTQI+ migrants visas to safe countries are prohibitive for many reasons, and boating across the mediterranean or flying to a South American country to trek the continent, traverse the Amazon to the U.S. Southern border, risky and unadvisable. The former and latter have been done but cover a small minority of asylum seekers, and involve having some financial resources as well as life or death risks. There is the added risk of a journey to an America now governed with Trump’s extensive anti-asylum border policies.
For many this is the only flight option and it is one that fails protection: Most cross a border/s into neighboring African countries, to seek protection, in the hope of resettlement, noting that asylum in those countries is impossible because they also criminalize/ persecute LGBTQI+ people in the same way as their home countries of origin. This is the “from the fire into the frying pan” option. Over 30 out of the 54 African countries harbor criminalizing laws and for almost every country that does not, societal taboos foster very similar anti-LGBTQI+ country conditions climates as those that do have such laws.
So by way of one example, and there are many more: a Ugandan’s choices include fleeing to immediate border countries such as Kenya, Sudan, Tanzania, DRC, Burundi and Rwanda ( which all criminalize LGBTQI+, except the latter has no criminal code but still harbors severe societal taboos including abuse of indecency and vagrancy laws against LGBTQI+). All these countries have turned out to be hostile host countries with enormous barriers to protection, where LGBTQI+ people continue to be abused and persecuted in the same way as in their home countries. The only difference is they have a layer of protection through international instruments that apply, as well as the work of UNHCR which acts to a large extent as guardrail for protection. However the reality is that the laws of a sovereign country which criminalize LGBTQI+ people are impenetrable even by a United Nations agency, leading to complications when it comes to delivering the full range of protections for LGBTqI+ people. For the past ten years countries like the United States of America have not been able to impact this reality or change anything on the continent except top preside over a worsening environment , even with a dedicated LGBTqI+ envoy in the White House. Now with the new Trump administration and its attempts to suspend the USA refugee program, the pathways and uncertainties are even more daunting.
Most African countries, are UNSAFE and Dangerous for LGBTQI+ refugees and it is an environment where protection is impossible to deliver to LGBTQI+ individuals in the same way as the heterosexual and cisgender counterparts. This is because they are seen as criminals for the very reason that they flee. Here is an analogy to help understand. The way LGBTQI+ fleeing criminalizing laws are treated in the majority of countries is tantamount to being bank robbers. Just by virtue of the criminalization of SOGIESC - it is as if a bank robber is showing up in a neighboring country and asking to be protected by the host country from the crime of bank robbery that they committed in their home country. Of course the host country also has similar criminal codes to punish bank robbery and hence will not want to provide support and protect from such laws. In fact they could be arrested in their host country especially where extradition may apply, such as in the case of the new pending Ghana law. This translates into what is actually happening on the ground in these countries.
Refusals of hostile governments to register LGBTQI+ asylum seekers
Years without process or mandates and no durable solutions
Inability to shelter, food, critical services, including medical needs
Arbitrary arrests, blackmail, unlawful detentions
Dangerous protection environments at hands of fellow anti-LGBTQI+ refugee populations
There is an important aspect in seeking protection that is a major issue facing LGBTQI+ people impacting their protection: If one is claiming protection it is critical to self-disclose the reason one is seeking protection - with 100% honesty, transparency and authenticity. Imagine a bank robber showing up to an authority for protection and having to disclose that he is a bank robber in order to receive that protection. Not only would he be reluctant to do that, but may advise him to hide that fact. That is precisely what is happening with LGBTQI migrants.
At African Human Rights Coalition we are receiving constant reports from LGBTQI + people seeking refugee mandates in protection environments stating that:
they are too afraid to self-disclose for fear of exposure and homophobic repercussions similar to what they experienced in their country of origin
they have been advised by someone in an agency/NGO/civil society not to tell authorities they are LGBTQI+ and to come up with some other story to justify their flight
they have been insulted, screamed at, abused in the refugee environment by an official, thereby exposing them to the other refugees as LGBTQI+ setting them up for the very violence they experienced in their country of origin.
Despite the 2021 UNHCR Thematic Workshop in Geneva, which I led, to focus on this issue of the barriers to self-disclosure at reception, there have been no effective solutions that are consistent to improve this major challenge. LGBTQI+ Africans need a go between agency or civil society representative such as AHRC to broker their approach and introduction so that reception can be privately held in special spaces, created to combat expo0sure and sanger and build trust. (One such remedy) Essentially AHRC has played this role in some ways.
African Human Rights Coalition has conducted a comprehensive analysis through case data, to come up in aggregate with a country score for which countries present as the most challenging for LGBTQI+ people seeking protections. The issue factors are scored on a scale 1-5 (5 being worst): This includes Government refusal to provide steady and consistent RSD, Access to services in country of protection, access to shelter and food support in country of protection, arbitrary arrests and unlawful detentions in country of protection. There are other criteria we are working on to add to a more expansive analysis.
SCORES WORST TO BEST:
(Full Negative Score is 30/30)
Senegal: 30
Zimbabwe: 30
Uganda: 28
Burundi: 25
South Sudan: 24
Malawi: 18
Kenya: 17.5 (Without Kakuma- add 5) – 22.5
Zambia: 14.5 (Without Makeni – add 5) – 19.5
IV. SOLUTIONS: SOUTH AFRICA/ BOTSWANA/
Except for islands Cape Verde, Seychelles, and Mauritius, excluded by proximity, only 2 African countries, South Africa and Botswana, seem feasibly positioned to provide protection to Africa’s LGBTQI+ communities. These countries are under-utilized and could prove to be a solution given the resources and properly planned protocols. (See solutions below)
Botswana has decriminalized HOMOSEXUALITY, through the courts, but does not have a constitution or legislation worded overtly to include LGBTQI+ people. However it is a country that could be considered as a feasible transit country for LGBTII people.
South Africa is the only country on the continent that makes sense for a targeted well planned and orchestrated solution to Africa’s LGBTQI+ problem.
With funding, advocacy and support South Africa can uniquely accomplish a process that cannot be achieved anywhere else on the continent for all above reasons.
This would have to be UNHCR and Civil Society led. I believe only UNHCR would be equiped to take this on and that it could be a solution to the LGBTqI+ problem that is almsot impossible to navigate diplomatically and financially across the continent.
South Africa not only does not criminalize LGBTQI+ people but also has a fully inclusive constitution that prescribes 100% equality to LGBTQI+ people.
While one may think that ought to position it as a country of asylum, it is suggested this should only be provided as an option for those who may not qualify for resettlement.
The reason all cannot be processed for asylum in SA would be the extensive xenophobia and the extremely high unemployment rate, as well as the remnants of societal homophobia, transphobia, and high incidents of corrective rape of lesbians.
But South Africa has the law on its side, as is not the case in other countries and hence minimizes the hurdles presented in other countries. Gays are not tantamount to bank robbers in South Africa. Because of the barriers asylum should be a last resort for those who have no other alternative. At least they would have a path to asylum in a non-criminalizing equality-based country as an alternative to rejection of refugee mandates for resettlement.
South Africa is for all reasons above and more the perfect venue to process LGBTQI+ refugees for resettlement abroad. I believe this will require a dedicated robust joint venture office between UNHCR and Civil Society and the South African Government to get the job done. For example the very experienced HIAS recently opened an office in South Africa, and although not involved in resettlement, has structure and expertise to play a role.
This office will have the challenge of partnering with South Africa’s Home Affairs Office which is notoriously inefficient and corrupt, yet with a dedicated department which could be negotiated with the South African government could accomplish much for LGBTQI+ migrants seeking protection, mandates and asylum or resettlement. Management or oversight through the UN agency could have a profoundly productive impact. This is an environment begging for action. This is the ONLY solution. The past ten years working in this environment has led me to this proactive nuanced and innovative approach. There is much I have not conveyed here that requires deep understanding, including how to create the pathways, how to avert fraud. I am of the belief that there have been gatekeepers who have turned their backs on solution by refusing to explore innovation. Now is he time for change – especially when it seems more and more doors are closing, and the problems festering and increasing. This can no longer be “business as usual”. Its time too open this new door and to take charge of what seems promising and feasible, at whatever risk. There is nothing to lose given the dire state for LGBTQI+ refugees in all the other countries, languishing with no support. Living in limbo and constant fear with unsupported for the most basic of daily needs is a death sentence in and of itself. This must change now. It is in our power to team up and get it done.
SEE PDF LONG VERSION ATTACHED
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