The Gambian penal code punishes same-sex sexual activity with up to fourteen years of imprisonment (Itaborahy, 2012). Same-sex couples receive neither legal recognition nor protection from discrimination and cannot adopt children (LGBT Net, 2014). Societal discrimination against LGBTQI individuals is very strong (Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, 2011). Government authorities have exacerbated issues through hateful public statements in the past, once ordering, “all LGBT persons to leave the country within 24 hours and,” threatening, “to cut off their heads”—though there were no reports of violence against afterwards.Due to the danger of being publicity, harassment and violence against SGMs maybe going unrecorded—a major loss in this critical moment following the end of Yahya Jammeh’s twenty-three years in power. As the Truth, Reconciliation and Reparations Commission works to move the nation forward, “LGBT Gambians... may be the one group whose rights do not improve in the post-Jammeh era” (Scheinert, 2019).
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Marriage for Same-Sex Couples
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Civil Unions
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Joint Adoption
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Second Parent Adoption
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Employment Nondiscrimination Laws
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Broad Protections
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Criminalization of Violence
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Ban of Conversion Therapy
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Consensual Same-Sex Acts are Legal?
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Gender
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Max Penalty (Yrs in Prison)
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Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor(2011, April).2010 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices. United States Department of State. https://2009-2017.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2010/af/154348.htm
Itaborahy, L. P. (2012, May). State-Sponsored Homophobia. The International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans, And Intersex Association. https://web.archive.org/web/20120611181908/http://old.ilga.org/Statehomophobia/ILGA_State_Sponsored_Homophobia_2012.pdf
LGBTNet. (2014, November). Gambia. LGBT Denmark. http://www.lgbtnet.dk/countries/africa/gambia
Mendes, L. R. (2019, March). State-Sponsored Homophobia.The International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans, And Intersex Association. https://ilga.org/downloads/ILGA_State_Sponsored_Homophobia_2019.pdf
Scheinert, J. (2019, March). No truth for Gambia’s queer people. Mail & Guardian. https://mg.co.za/article/2019-03-15-00-no-truth-for-gambias-queer-people/
The World Bank. (2019). Gambia.Data. https://data.worldbank.org/country/GM
United Nations Aids. (2019). AidsInfo. United Nations. http://aidsinfo.unaids.org/