A lesbian church leader lights pink, yellow and purple candles, and passes them around to worshipers as they pray for a court decision that would mean they no longer have to live a lie.
“The Lord is in control,” she said, as swaying congregants yelled out “Victory” and a musician shut his eyes in prayer, his fingers dancing across a keyboard laid on a table covered with a rainbow flag.
The Cosmopolitan Affirming Church (CAC) is a rare space where Kenya’s LGBT community can escape hostility, which is often reflected in hatred and vitriol from religious pulpits.
Photo: AFP
Dozens of LGBT churchgoers and their allies crammed into a tiny room on Sunday to worship ahead of tomorrow’s potentially historic decision by Kenya’s High Court on whether laws that criminalize homosexuality are unconstitutional.
“When this law is struck down it is going to be a huge kind of liberation for us, like a burden has been taken off our shoulders,” said David Ochara, who helped found the church in 2013.
Kenya’s colonial-era laws echo those in more than half of Africa’s countries, where homosexuality is illegal. Being gay can even lead to the death penalty in Mauritania, Sudan, northern Nigeria and parts of Somalia.
One section of the penal code says that anyone who has “carnal knowledge ... against the order of nature” can be imprisoned for 14 years, while another could land a person in jail for five years for “indecent practices between males.”
“The law specifies ‘in public or private,’ which essentially allows police to enter our bedrooms to investigate these crimes,” said Eric Gitari, cofounder of the National Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Council, one of the petitioners.
Imani Kimiri of the council’s legal team said that her office last year dealt with 15 prosecutions under the laws, but cannot recall the last conviction — slamming the process as “just a frustrating endeavor.”
In 2014, a government report to appease the legislature’s anti-gay caucus reported about 600 prosecutions over three years.
However, Gitari said that 70 percent of these were “conflated” and some turned out to be cases of child rape, bestiality or even traffic offenses.
The biggest fear is the persecution that the laws allow.
“Because of the law you fear blackmail, you fear extortion, you fear violence ... because there is no law protecting you and the law is against you,” said Arthur Owiti, who plays the keyboard in church.
The council in 2017 recorded an increase in cases where people using online dating applications such as Grindr end up being blackmailed or extorted, often by organized gangs who work with police.
“When you get a date online you have to ask them security questions so you don’t fall into a trap,” Owiti said.
Those who are blackmailed, evicted, fired, expelled from school or assaulted over their sexual orientation are unable to access justice, because it means “confessing to a crime,” Gitari said.
While Gitari pointed to court decisions as cause for optimism, most advocates agree that even if the court rules in their favor, it would be tied up in appeals for the foreseeable future.
In March last year, the High Court banned forced anal testing of men suspected of being gay, and in September a court ruled that Rafiki (“Friend”), a film about a lesbian love affair, could be screened for seven days after its initial banning.
Kenya’s decision could reverberate across the continent, where several countries are facing challenges to similar legislation.
Mozambique in 2015 struck down anti-gay laws, and Angola decriminalized homosexuality last month. Botswana is expected to hear a case against its laws next month.
“The law is one of the means of changing society,” Gitari said. “Politically, there is a chance for African states to assert themselves in their grounding of justice which is inclusive of LGBT persons without necessarily having to give in to political pressure, which is external.”
During the court case, local experts testified on the history of homosexuality in Kenya — often decried by politicians as a colonial import — and also leaned on a decision decriminalizing homosexuality in India last year.
Ochara believes that Kenyans are ready to begin a discussion about homosexuality.
In the meantime, the reality for those like Arthur is that “basically you live a lie,” with brief moments of respite in safe spaces such as the CAC.
He said that before CAC, he attended a church “where the messages every Sunday were that homosexuals, lesbians, they are not loved by God... It was like being stabbed every time.”
In between rousing gospel music and moments of candlelit reflection, the pastors gave a security update ahead of the court case, urging congregants to avoid certain hot spots and be careful if attending the ruling.
“I know you are fabulous, but don’t make yourself an easy target — you don’t need to have rainbow feathers on your head and all that sexiness,” Ochara said.
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