World
Africa reeling from scourge of gender-based violence
The pandemic, poverty has exacerbated problem
The effects of gender-based violence in Africa are now being reverberated throughout the continent and have been exacerbated by the current COVID-19 pandemic.
A country like South Africa, according to Public Works and Administration Minister Ayanda Dlodlo, has the highest rate of gender-based violence in the world, a sentiment which was recently echoed by Police Minister Bheki Cele, who cited that over 1,000 cases of gender-based violence are recorded on a daily basis in South Africa.
However, regardless of South Africa being a hotspot of gender-based violence, it is not the only country on the continent that is witnessing a surge in the cases. Relatively all the countries in Africa are now seeing an increase in the number of gender-based violence cases.
Although cultural and religious norms have been seen as the major contributing facets to the issue of gender-based violence, unemployment and poverty have also been highlighted as among the major reasons of the scourge and as a matter of fact, Africa is regarded as the poorest continent by organizations such as the U.N., the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund with millions surviving on less than $1 per day.
As a result, the anger associated with hunger, unemployment and lack of financial stability is in most cases channeled towards the “weaker gender” as Nicola Rodda, a victim and gender-based violence activist from South Africa who I interviewed aptly states.
“My view of the cause of GBV is that the abuser feels a lack of power in some situation and regains the sense of power through abusing the weaker victim whether be it sexually, physically, emotionally or financially with male on female and male on child violence being the most common but they are not the only forms that occur but the two I have mentioned are the most prevalent,” said Nicola.
With that being said, I also took up the cause by interviewing Knowledge Chuma from Zambia, the founder and chairperson of the Zambia Wushu Kungfu Federation, a non-profit organization that focuses on the issues of gender-based violence and he also shared the same sentiment as Nicola citing poverty and cultural norms as the root cause of GBV in Africa.
“The causes of GBV are deeply rooted in discriminatory cultural beliefs and attitudes that perpetuate inequality and powerlessness, in particular of women and girls. Various actors such as poverty, lack of education, livelihood opportunities, impunity for crimes and abuse also tend to contribute and reinforce the culture of discrimination and violence based on the gender. Such factors are frequently aggravated in terms of conflict and displacement as the rule of law, as societies and families are torn apart,” said Knowledge.
So now that the root cause of gender-based violence has been established one would now ask how then can the continent rid itself from such a heinous act? Rest assured this is the follow-up question I also brought before Knowledge and Nicola which they tackled immaculately and not only that but they both came out with ways a victim of gender-based violence can be able to get assistance from law enforcement agents and how friends and family members can help in the journey to recovery.
“The best way for the continent to tackle gender-based violence is multifactorial. In Africa, we tend to have patriarchal societies in which men hold greater power than women so it is easy for a conflict to degenerate into a situation where a man exerts his power over the woman either physically or sexually. So the solution to that is not just changing patriarchal roles although education can play a large role of understanding gender equality and equal gender rights, however, in the broader context the sense of helplessness and powerlessness created in the abuser can often be the result of poverty, unemployment, feeling powerless in the face of economic or other social pressure so uplifting the continent as a whole in terms of job availability, quality of life, quality of services would help in bringing out gender-based violence in addition to a strong element of education on gender equality and the right of a female or child not to live in fear of their abuser.
Moreover, if one reports a case of gender-based violence to the police and no action is taken then the victim should approach the head of the police and if there is still no action then the victim has to approach the courts directly for perfection and the best way family members and friends can assist a victim of gender-based violence would be to help the victim, remove herself or himself from the circumstances because by and large it is true that an abuser who abuses once will abuse again so the best way is not to allow the victim near the abuser.
In addition, a victim can also approach trauma counsellors that can be accessed through the police or gender-based violence organizations free of charge and also to find further recourse of being able to defend herself or himself be it physically or financially through organizations like Legal Aid or religious organizations because that can protect the victim and provide support for the victim in the longer term from being re-abused either by the original abuser or another person who might perceive him or her vulnerable. Gender-based violence is one of the biggest scourges that is being faced on the African continent,” said Nicola.
Moreover, Knowledge cited that education is the most important factor and also shared some words of wisdom on how friends and family can be able to approach and engage with a victim of gender-based violence that does not show apathy.
“What the African continent must do to avert the issue of GBV is to educate youths and adults about this serious issue. We need to give the youths the arts, sports or academic skills that they might need in future to avoid lack of employment that leads to depression and anxiety because that also contributes to the causes of GBV.
If friends or family are approached by the victim the best way is by responding in a soothing manner such as, I believe you! I am here for you! You can tell me as much or as little as you want! It is not your fault! I am glad you told me! I am glad you came to me! So we need to support them because if we do not it becomes discriminatory,” said Knowledge.
The onus is now upon every African to do their best in lynching off gender-based violence as on a daily basis it leaves someone with a mental or physical challenge and catastrophic challenges for the bereaved.
Kazakhstan
Kazakh lawmakers advance anti-LGBTQ propaganda bill
Measure likely to pass in country’s Senate
Lawmakers in Kazakhstan on Wednesday advanced a bill that would ban so-called LGBTQ propaganda in the country.
Reuters notes the measure, which members of the country’s lower house of parliament unanimously approved, would ban “‘LGBT propaganda’ online or in the media” with “fines for violators and up to 10 days in jail for repeat offenders.”
The bill now goes to the Kazakh Senate.
Reuters reported senators will likely support the measure. President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev has also indicated he would sign it.
Kazakhstan is a predominantly Muslim former Soviet republic in Central Asia that borders Russia, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and China.
Consensual same-sex sexual relations are decriminalized in Kazakhstan, but the State Department’s 2023 human rights report notes human rights activists have “reported threats of violence and significant online and in-person verbal abuse towards LGBTQI+ individuals.” The document also indicates discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity remains commonplace in the country. (Jessica Stern, the former special U.S. envoy for the promotion of LGBTQ and intersex rights under the Biden-Harris administration who co-founded the Alliance for Diplomacy and Justice, in August condemned the current White House for the “deliberate erasure” of LGBTQ and intersex people from the State Department’s 2024 human rights report.)
Russia, Georgia, and Hungary are among the other countries with propaganda laws.
Turks and Caicos Islands
Turks and Caicos government ordered to recognize gay couple’s marriage
Richard Sankar and Tim Haymon legally married in Fla. in 2020
The Turks and Caicos Islands’ Court of Appeal has ruled the British territory’s government must recognize a same-sex couple’s marriage.
Richard Sankar, a realtor who has lived in the British territory for nearly three decades and is a Turks and Caicos citizen, married Tim Haymon in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., in 2020.
Haymon, who is American, in August 2021 applied for a spousal exemption under the Turks and Caicos’ immigration law on the basis of his status as a spouse that would have allowed him to legally live and work in the territory.
The Turks and Caicos’ Director of Immigration initially denied the application because its definition of marriage used does not include same-sex couples.
Haymon and Sankar filed their lawsuit in October 2021. The Supreme Court heard the case in November 2022.
The court in March 2024 ruled the government’s refusal to issue a work permit exemption for Haymon violates the Turks and Caicos’ constitution that bans discrimination based on sexual orientation. The government appealed the decision, and the Court of Appeal heard it in January 2025.
The Court of Appeal in September dismissed the government’s appeal. It released its decision on Oct. 27.
Stanbrook Prudhoe, a law firm in the Turks and Caicos, represents Haymon and Sankar.
“Just like any other spouse coming to the Turks and Caicos Islands and marrying a Turks and Caicos islander, we’re just wanting the same rights,” Haymon told the Blade during a March 2024 interview.
Haymon told the Blade he has received his “spousal certificate that gives me residency and the right to work” in the British territory in the British territory. The government appealed a 2022 Supreme Court ruling that ordered it to give him the certificate, but the Court of Appeals denied it.
The Supreme Court ordered the Director of Immigration to grant Haymon a residence permit. He told the Blade he received it on Monday.
The Turks and Caicos are a group of islands that are located roughly 650 miles southeast of Miami.
Consensual same-sex sexual relations have been decriminalized in the British territory since 2001.
The constitution states “every unmarried man and woman of marriageable age (as determined by or under any law) has the right to marry a person of the opposite sex and found a family.” The constitution also says “every person in the islands is entitled to the fundamental rights and freedoms of the individual, that is to say, the right, without distinction of any kind, such as race, national or social origin, political or other opinion, color, religion, language, creed, association with a national minority, property, sex, sexual orientation, birth, or other status.”
Then-Cayman Islands Grand Court Chief Justice Anthony Smellie in 2019 ruled same-sex couples can legally marry in the Cayman Islands. The Caymanian Court of Appeal later overturned the decision, and the British territory’s Civil Partnership Law took effect in 2020.
Then-Bermuda Supreme Court Justice Charles-Etta Simmons in 2017 issued a ruling that paved the way for gays and lesbians to legally marry in the British territory. The Domestic Partnership Act — a law then-Gov. John Rankin signed that allows same-sex couples to enter into domestic partnerships as opposed to get married — took effect in 2018.
Bermuda’s top court later found the Domestic Partnership Act unconstitutional. The Privy Council, a British territories appellate court in London, upheld the law. It also ruled same-sex couples do not have the constitutional right to marry in the Cayman Islands.
The Turks and Caicos government has until Nov. 24 to appeal the Court of Appeals decision. It remains possible the Privy Council’s Judicial Committee could hear Haymon and Sankar’s case.
El Salvador
El Salvador: el costo del silencio oficial ante la violencia contra la comunidad LGBTQ
Entidades estatales son los agresores principales
En El Salvador, la violencia contra la población LGBTQ no ha disminuido: ha mutado. Lo que antes se expresaba en crímenes de odio, hoy se manifiesta en discriminación institucional, abandono y silencio estatal. Mientras el discurso oficial evita cualquier referencia a inclusión o diversidad, las cifras muestran un panorama alarmante.
Según el Informe 2025 sobre las vulneraciones de los derechos humanos de las personas LGBTQ en El Salvador, elaborado por el Observatorio de Derechos Humanos LGBTIQ+ de ASPIDH, con el apoyo de Hivos y Arcus Foundation, desde el 1 de enero al 22 de septiembre de 2025 se registraron 301 denuncias de vulneraciones de derechos.
El departamento de San Salvador concentra 155 de esas denuncias, reflejando la magnitud del problema en la capital.
Violencia institucionalizada: el Estado como principal agresor
El informe revela que las formas más recurrentes de violencia son la discriminación (57 por ciento), seguida de intimidaciones y amenazas (13 por ciento), y agresiones físicas (10 por ciento). Pero el dato más inquietante está en quiénes ejercen esa violencia.
Los cuerpos uniformados, encargados de proteger a la población, son los principales perpetradores:
- 31.1 por ciento corresponde a la Policía Nacional Civil (PNC),
- 26.67 por ciento al Cuerpo de Agentes Municipales (CAM),
- 12.22 por ciento a militares desplegados en las calles bajo el régimen de excepción.
A ello se suma un 21.11 por ciento de agresiones cometidas por personal de salud pública, especialmente por enfermeras, lo que demuestra que la discriminación alcanza incluso los espacios que deberían garantizar la vida y la dignidad.
Loidi Guardado, representante de ASPIDH, comparte con Washington Blade un caso que retrata la cotidianidad de estas violencias:
“Una enfermera en la clínica VICITS de San Miguel, en la primera visita me reconoció que la persona era hijo de un promotor de salud y fue amable. Pero luego de realizarle un hisopado cambió su actitud a algo despectiva y discriminativa. Esto le sucedió a un hombre gay.”
Este tipo de episodios reflejan un deterioro en la atención pública, impulsado por una postura gubernamental que rechaza abiertamente cualquier enfoque de inclusión, y tacha la educación de género como una “ideología” a combatir.
El discurso del Ejecutivo, que se opone a toda iniciativa con perspectiva de diversidad, ha tenido consecuencias directas: el retroceso en derechos humanos, el cierre de espacios de denuncia, y una mayor vulnerabilidad para quienes pertenecen a comunidades diversas.
El miedo, la desconfianza y el exilio silencioso
El estudio también señala que el 53.49 por ciento de las víctimas son mujeres trans, seguidas por hombres gays (26.58 por ciento). Sin embargo, la mayoría de las agresiones no llega a conocimiento de las autoridades.
“En todos los ámbitos de la vida —salud, trabajo, esparcimiento— las personas LGBT nos vemos intimidadas, violentadas por parte de muchas personas. Sin embargo, las amenazas y el miedo a la revictimización nos lleva a que no denunciemos. De los casos registrados en el observatorio, el 95.35 por ciento no denunció ante las autoridades competentes”, explica Guardado.
La organización ASPIDH atribuye esta falta de denuncia a varios factores: miedo a represalias, desconfianza en las autoridades, falta de sensibilidad institucional, barreras económicas y sociales, estigma y discriminación.
Además, la ausencia de acompañamiento agrava la situación, producto del cierre de numerosas organizaciones defensoras por falta de fondos y por las nuevas normativas que las obligan a registrarse como “agentes extranjeros”.
Varias de estas organizaciones —antes vitales para el acompañamiento psicológico, legal y educativo— han migrado hacia Guatemala y Costa Rica ante la imposibilidad de operar en territorio salvadoreño.
Educación negada, derechos anulados
Mónica Linares, directora ejecutiva de ASPIDH, lamenta el deterioro de los programas educativos que antes ofrecían una oportunidad de superación para las personas trans:
“Hubo un programa del ACNUR que lamentablemente, con todo el cierre de fondos que hubo a partir de las declaraciones del presidente Trump y del presidente Bukele, pues muchas de estas instancias cerraron por el retiro de fondos del USAID.”
Ese programa —añade— beneficiaba a personas LGBTQ desde la educación primaria hasta el nivel universitario, abriendo puertas que hoy permanecen cerradas.
Actualmente, muchas personas trans apenas logran completar la primaria o el bachillerato, en un sistema educativo donde la discriminación y el acoso escolar siguen siendo frecuentes.
Organizaciones en resistencia
Las pocas organizaciones que aún operan en el país han optado por trabajar en silencio, procurando no llamar la atención del gobierno. “Buscan pasar desapercibidas”, señala Linares, “para evitar conflictos con autoridades que las ven como si no fueran sujetas de derechos”.
Desde el Centro de Intercambio y Solidaridad (CIS), su cofundadora Leslie Schuld coincide. “Hay muchas organizaciones de derechos humanos y periodistas que están en el exilio. Felicito a las organizaciones que mantienen la lucha, la concientización. Porque hay que ver estrategias, porque se está siendo silenciado, nadie puede hablar; hay capturas injustas, no hay derechos.”
Schuld agrega que el CIS continuará apoyando con un programa de becas para personas trans, con el fin de fomentar su educación y autonomía económica. Sin embargo, admite que las oportunidades laborales en el país son escasas, y la exclusión estructural continúa.
Matar sin balas: la anulación de la existencia
“En efecto, no hay datos registrados de asesinatos a mujeres trans o personas LGBTIQ+ en general, pero ahora, con la vulneración de derechos que existe en El Salvador, se está matando a esta población con la anulación de esta.”, reflexiona Linares.
Esa “anulación” a la que se refiere Linares resume el panorama actual: una violencia que no siempre deja cuerpos, pero sí vacíos. La negación institucional, la falta de políticas públicas, y la exclusión social convierten la vida cotidiana en un acto de resistencia para miles de salvadoreños LGBTQ.
En un país donde el Ejecutivo ha transformado la narrativa de derechos en una supuesta “ideología”, la diversidad se ha convertido en una amenaza política, y los cuerpos diversos, en un campo de batalla. Mientras el gobierno exalta la “seguridad” como su mayor logro, la población LGBTQ vive una inseguridad constante, no solo física, sino también emocional y social.
El Salvador, dicen los activistas, no necesita más silencio. Necesita reconocer que la verdadera paz no se impone con fuerza de uniformados, sino con justicia, respeto y dignidad.
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