How lgbtq are suffering in kenya
“I would rather die”: Kenyan gay and bisexual men’s experiences seeking healthcare
Young gay and multi-attracted men in Kenya experienced high levels of stigma and discrimination in universal healthcare facilities, while reporting more positive experiences in personal and gay-friendly clinics. Online interventions were seen as a way of catering to priority needs and reducing stigmatising experiences, according to a recent qualitative study.
Background
Gay sex is illegal in Kenya, which can build finding non-stigmatising services challenging. The Kenyan Ministry of Health recognises that male lover and bisexual men are a key population when it comes to HIV and other STI prevention. This enables community-based and non-governmental organisations to extend gay-friendly services. However, the social stigma related to entity gay, and having gay sex, is widespread and displayed by many healthcare providers across the country.
Dr Samuel Waweru Mwaniki from the University of Nairobi and colleagues had previously interviewed healthcare providers on their perspectives on treating gay men. In this study, they speak to male lover men themselves about experiences of stigma and discrimination in healthcare settin
Submission to the UN Committee Against Torture Highlights Abuse against LGBTIQ+ Persons in Kenya
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Today REDRESS and our Kenyan partners, the National Gay & Lesbian Human Rights Commission (NGLHRC), made a submission to the Committee against Torture (CAT) as part of its examination of Kenya’s treaty obligations, which will grab place from 19 April to 13 May 2022.
The submission draws the Committee’s attention to the discriminatory violence suffered by individuals identifying or perceived as LGBTIQ+ in Kenya, which often amounts to torture or other ill-treatment. It also puts forward a number of recommendations for legislative and policy reforms, as well as educational initiatives which, if effectively implemented by the Express, could increase the legal protection of LGBTIQ+ persons, and strengthen the State’s capacity to prevent and respond to violence against the LGBTIQ+ community.
The submission draws on the operate of NGLHRC and other civil society organisations in Kenya who, despite the challenges, continue to assist LGBTIQ+ person who are victims of violence.
Harassment and discrimination against the LGBTIQ+ community
In a context of hostility towards the
‘We’ve lost so many lives’: Why LGBTQ+ refugees are giving up on Kenya
What’s the context?
Kenya was a haven for LGBTQ+ refugees but rising hostility is pushing some to utmost measures, like leaving for South Sudan
When Kevin was 20-years-old, he left his central Ugandan village and hitched a ride with a lorry carrying maize and beans towards the border.
The trans man decided to escape a stifling forced marriage in which he was expected to be a wife. Still presenting as a gal, he could not say his husband, a family friend, who he really was.
Arriving at the border, Kevin hopped out of the truck and slipped into Kenya without a passport. He had heard that Kenya took in refugees, even if he did not know at the time that it was the only land in East Africa that has accepted people facing persecution for their sexual or gender identity.
But five years later, Kevin still lacks official refugee status in Kenya. Instead of freedom to express his true gender, he has found himself in a country where he feels as vulnerable as he was at home.
Speaking out about his situation puts him at further peril, which is why he’s using a pseudonym. But Kevin’s experience
Homophobia: Africa’s moral blind spot
On April 17, Sheila Adhiambo Lumumba, a 25-year-old genderfluid lesbian, was found murdered in Karatina, Kenya. Lumumba had been missing for several days before their body was found. An autopsy report revealed that Lumumba was raped, strangled, stabbed several times in the neck and eyes and their legs had been broken.
Human rights groups lamented Lumumba’s untimely and violent passing. The hashtag #JusticeForSheila trended on Kenyan Twitter for several days after their passing. The Kenya Human Rights Commission called on authorities to investigate the gruesome murder and stressed that “too many queer Kenyans are getting killed with no accountability for perpetrators”. Amnesty Kenya shared similar sentiments and asserted, “no one deserves such cruel treatment. Sheila didn’t have to experience all this pain”, and the National Lgbtq+ and Lesbian Human Rights Commission described Lumumba’s death as “part of a pattern of attacks and violence against LGBTIQ+ persons in the country”.
And sadly, it is true that this gruesome murder was not an anomaly – members of the LGBTQ community are facing discrimination, hate and violence because of who they are
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Last updated: 12 May 2025
Types of criminalisation
- Criminalises LGBT people
- Criminalises sexual activity between males
Summary
Same-sex sexual activity is prohibited under the Penal Code 1930, which criminalises acts of ‘gross indecency’ and ‘carnal truth against the arrange of nature’. These provisions carry a maximum penalty of fourteen years’ imprisonment. Only men are criminalised under this law.
The law was inherited from the British during the colonial period, in which the English criminal law was imposed upon Kenya. Kenya retained its colonial-era penal code upon independence and continues to criminalise same-sex sexual outing today.
There is some evidence of the law being enforced in recent years, with LGBT people occasionally being subject to arrest under the criminalising provisions, though reports offer that police more often use laws criminalising ‘loitering’, ‘solicitation’, and ‘impersonation’ to arrest LGBT people. There have been consistent repor