Gay in senegal
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Last updated: 15 July 2025
Types of criminalisation
- Criminalises LGBT people
- Criminalises sexual activity between males
- Criminalises sexual activity between females
Summary
Same-sex sexual activity is prohibited under the Penal Code 1965, which criminalises ‘unnatural acts’. This provision carries a maximum penalty of five years’ imprisonment. Both men and women are criminalised under this law.
In 1960, Senegal officially gained freedom from France, which had long since decriminalised queer sexual activity. As such the criminalising law is of local origin, having been adopted in the 1965 Penal Code.
There is substantial evidence of the law being enforced in recent years, with LGBT people being frequently subject to arrest and arbitrary detention where they are vulnerable to torture. There have been consistent reports of discrimination and abuse against LGBT people in recent years, including murder, assault, mob attacks, harassment, and threats.
Law and Legal Developments
2021
In December, a group of
Two jailed in Senegal for criticising PM on lgbtq+ rights
The political activist and the preacher were arrested two weeks ago after posting a video attacking Mr Sonko for giving a platform to Jean-Luc Mélenchon, a far-left French politician.
Mr Mélenchon gave his opinion about same-sex marriages at a student forum in the capital, Dakar, in mid-May.
His comments reportedly sparked boos from the audience at Cheikh Anta Diop University.
In response Mr Sonko said that Western countries should show restraint on social matters such as LGBTQ rights as it could "lead to anti-Western sentiment".
Senegal would proceed to manage issues around homosexuality in accordance with its socio-cultural norms, the prime minister said.
He was quoted as saying that homosexuality was "not acknowledged, but tolerated" in Senegal.
Mr Sonko, a former firebrand opposition leader, was appointed prime minister in April after his ally Bassirou Diomaye Faye was elected president.
They were freed from prison not long before the vote in an amnesty aimed at calming months of political turmoil after the outgoing president had tried to postpone the election.
The pair campaigned on a promise o
Gay Muslim men living with HIV in Senegal are being persecuted and state shame, violence and isolation
Gay Muslim men living with HIV in Dakar face persecution such as violence and incarceration due to their sexuality. Many are socially isolated, often because of religious or political factors, despite queer relationships being historically acceptable. Researchers at the University of Rochester in the US and the University Cheikh Anta Diop in Senegal aimed to investigate the impact that the combination of these unlike forms of stigma had on these men and their lived experiences.
In Senegal 90% of the population identify as Muslim and faith has a mighty influence on social norms. Although less than 1% of the population hold HIV, in gay men the rate of infection is 28%. This review concluded that the difference in HIV rates between these communities needs to be addressed by reducing stigma and involving political and religious leaders in the process. However, Sharia law condemns homosexuality and stigma is fuelled by media perceptions, so this is no easy task.
Interviews of 30 gay Muslim men living with HIV in Dakar, aged between 18 and 55 were conducted by a multi-lingua
Quietly queer in Senegal
When in April this year, a video went viral of two high school girls kissing, Senegalese media reported about the “scandal” and the Islamic NGO Jamra was quick to blame Sourire de Femme, the country’s only known corporation for queer women, of promoting lesbianism. Over the past decade numerous of such “scandals” about the immoral behavior of women and queer persons (both male- and female-bodied) hold featured in the media, causing strong reactions from society that warns of the moral decay of Senegalese society.
In the West, such reactions feed into the imagination of Africa as the most homophobic continent. Over the past two or three decades, dissident sexualities and gender identities have taken center stage in debates in and about Africa. Western conceptions of Africans’ problematic relation to sexuality is not new. When HIV/AIDS was discovered in Uganda in the mid-1980s and quickly spread to all corners of the African continent, sexuality became a serious concern and reason for action for many international donors and NGOs. Today, such global health interventions in Africa are accompanied with concerns for human rig
.