Tanzania governor declares hunt for gay people

[FlyJ]

The governor of Tanzania’s most-populated city, Dar es Salaam, has created a team to round up gay people.

Paul Makonda urged the city’s more than four million residents to report any information they have about gay people before the crackdown starts on November 6, according to AFP.

In the declaration on Monday (October 29), he said: “Give me their names. My ad hoc team will begin to get their hands on them next Monday.”

Queer people can face up to life imprisonment in Tanzania if convicted of having gay sex.

Makonda, who has held his position since 2016, said: “I have information about the presence of many homosexuals in our province.

“These homosexuals boast on social networks.”

The governor said that gay sex “tramples on the moral values of Tanzanians and our two Christian and Muslim religions.”

Makonda was anticipating backlash from people who lived outside Tanzania, but said that he would “prefer to anger those countries than to anger God.”

Police officers in Dar es Salaam arrested 12 men last year, accusing them of “promoting homosexuality” and engaging in gay sex.

And at least 20 people were arrested for “homosexual activity” in a police raid in Tanzania’s semi-autonomous region of Zanzibar.

The country’s penal code criminalises anyone who “has carnal knowledge of any person against the order of nature.”

Last year, Tanzania stopped health clinics from providing HIV services, saying they “cater to homosexuals.”

It is believed that 33,000 people in Tanzania died from AIDS-related illnesses in 2016.

Many other countries on the continent also face oppressive actions from their government officials, with a study earlier this week finding that Malawi’s anti-gay laws mean members of the LGBT+ community are vulnerable to arbitrary arrest, physical violence and discrimination.

Earlier this month, Uganda’s first LGBT+ centre was labelled a “criminal act” by Simon Lokodo, the country’s minister for ethics and integrity.

He said homosexuality was “completely unacceptable” and that he would not allow it to be “popularised.”

Lokodo also attempted to shut down popular music festival MTN Nyege Nyege in September, on the grounds that it catered to the “celebration and recruitment of young people into homosexuality and LGBT movement.”

Despite the prevalence of anti-gay laws in Africa—where 34 countries still ban gay sex—and across the world, the Trump administration announced in July that it would not press countries to abolish their anti-LGBT laws.

Mick Mulvaney, a former Republican lawmaker who is Director of the Office of Management and Budget, criticised President Barack Obama’s administration for using taxpayer dollars “to discourage Christian values in other democratic countries.”

He added: “It was stunning to me that my government under the previous administration would go to folks in sub-Saharan Africa and say, ‘We know that you have a law against abortion, but if you enforce that law, you’re not going to get any of our money.

“‘We know you have a law against gay marriage, but if you enforce that law, we’re not going to give you any money.'”

He added: “That is a different type of religious persecution that I never expected to see. I never expected to see that as an American Christian, that we would be doing that to other folks.”

Source

[kimi]

It never ends does it. Smh...

[VINA]

Let them flee from that country in mass abeg! Wtf!! This literally just broke my heart thinking of the gay people there and how scared they would be now.

I wish we could all move to a fresh land and start our lives away from all these craziness.

[Isee]

Things like this break my heart. Isn't it this same Tanzania that albinos had to run for their dear lives because they were harvesting their organs for money making rituals. Seems like being different in that country is a very very serious crime.. 

[dequeen]

@omomegbe Being different on the African continent is a crime.

@vina I imagined if it happened in Nigeria....Horror of horrors.... I remember one time in Jo's when there were rumors of the government giving N14k to anyone who would out any gay person.... Scary times. 

Let's just hope Nigeria doesn't decide to copy them as it's our curse to always copy wrong things upandan.

@kimi No it doesn't.... And doesn't look like it will anytime soon.

[VINA]

16 hours ago, dequeen said:

orror of horrors.... I remember one time in Jo's when there were rumors of the government giving N14k to anyone who would out any gay person.... 

14k??? Omo make them add am 6k make e be 20k make i out myself!!!! Tempting, temptations. 

[dequeen]

9 hours ago, vina said:

14k??? Omo make them add am 6k make e be 20k make i out myself!!!! Tempting, temptations. 

Hahahaha! You go con carry the 20k do wetin?? Bribe DSS??

[VINA]

18 minutes ago, dequeen said:

Hahahaha! You go con carry the 20k do wetin?? Bribe DSS??

Lmao. I sleep cell na, meet other lesbians, collect number..

[Isee]

14 minutes ago, vina said:

Lmao. I sleep cell na, meet other lesbians, collect number..

Lmao, I swear I laughed so hard at this, didn't know when tears started dropping from my eyes. You are something else. 

[VINA]

4 minutes ago, omomegbe said:

Lmao, I swear I laughed so hard at this, didn't know when tears started dropping from my eyes. You are something else. 

Kikikikiki. I am serious sha.