Pierre, a gay inmate at Cameroon's Douala New Bell prison, wakes up on a makeshift table to avoid bed bugs, cleans to earn the right to sleep outdoors, and faces societal homophobia and exploitation by corrupt police. Cameroon is among 30 African countries criminalizing homosexual acts.
DOUALA — Pierre wakes up every morning atop a makeshift wooden table, in an open-air courtyard at the New Bell central prison in Douala, the most populous city in Cameroon .
Cameroon's penal code criminalizes"sexual relations with a person of the same sex," with a maximum sentence of five years in prison and a $450 fine. The third youth contracted tuberculosis in prison and could not do an interview. He along with Pierre and Jean are scheduled to be released next summer. The fourth youth paid a fine and has left the prison.Instead they found and dumped out a bag of condoms and lube Pierre was going to distribute to sex workers, as part of his job with an HIV-prevention organization. Pierre said the police used a homophobic slur to describe the contents.
"What do the police do? If you need 300,000 bucks for the weekend to go to your village that you can't find — that the state doesn't pay you — well then you arrest some nice homosexual on Friday," she said. The group's head, Patrick Fotso, said it's a major accounting challenge, as virtually all western governments bar their donations from being used to pay off cops.
The country's high commission in Ottawa did not respond to a request for comment prior to publication. Jean said being charged with homosexuality probably confirmed what his family already knew. Only his mother has been to visit him in prison, and she has no money to share. Nkom points out that Cameroon's penal code is subject to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as well as the African Union's human-rights body, which has called for an end to persecuting people on the basis of gender identity and sexual orientation since 2014.It's an argument she'd like to bring to the country's highest court, but few LGBTQ+ people manage to appeal their sentences.
Homophobia LGBTQ+ Rights Prison Conditions Cameroon Homosexual Acts
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