Anti-LGBTQ crackdown worsens in Tanzania
Less than two months after Muharami Hassan Nayonga received a 30-year prison sentence for engaging in anal sex, the Tanzanian government is seemingly intensifying its crackdown on the country’s LGBTQ and intersex community.
Nayonga’s case is not the first of its kind in the East African country. Several LGBTQ and intersex people often find themselves in a similar situation, but their cases do not make headlines because of opposition to LGBTQ and intersex rights in the country.
Police in 2018 raided a party and arrested 10 men on suspicion they were gay. “LGBTQI+ individuals cannot freely assemble, associate or express themselves publicly out of fear of identification, arrest, and discrimination or violence by police or family members,” reads the U.S.
State Department’s 2022 human rights report. LGBT Voice Tanzania, an LGBTQ and intersex rights organization in the country, says LGBTQ and intersex people who are currently behind bars face very harsh treatment from law enforcement officials. “Unfortunately, life for LGBTQIA people in Tanzania has only become more difficult because of the backwards leaders.
