The Cameroon lawyer risking everything to defend LGBT rights

Despite being ridiculed, threatened and publicly humiliated, former Cameroonian lawyer Alice Nkom is determined to respect the rights of homosexuals. in his country.

The human rights watchdog he runs, Redhac, was recently suspended by the government and is expected to appear before investigators to answer charges of embezzlement and support for terrorist groups – which he denies.

The 80-year-old says the authorities are hindering his work and believe they are targeting him because of his advocacy for the LGBT community.

“I will always defend homosexuals because they risk their freedom every day, and they are thrown into prison like dogs,” he told the BBC confidently, speaking in his office in the city of Douala.

“My job is to protect people. I don’t see why I can say I’m protecting anyone except homosexuals.”

Dressed in black, Ms Nkom delivers her message boldly in a voice that reflects years of conflict.

According to the country’s laws, men and women found guilty of homosexuality can be sentenced to five years in prison and fines. LGBT members are also discriminated against by their families and society at large.

Because of this, Mrs. Nkom is considered as a parent to some people in her country who have been open about sex with their families.

The legal expert has children of his own, but hundreds, if not thousands, of others look to him as their personal advocate following his more than two decades of work defending those accused of homosexuality.

“She is like our father and mother. She is the mother we find when our families run away from us,” said Sébastien, who is LGBT, not his real name.

Committed to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which is in Cameroon’s constitution, Mrs. Nkom says that freedom from discrimination on the grounds of sex should be seen as a basic right that goes beyond penal laws.

“You don’t have to restrict human rights, you don’t suppress them – you have to protect them,” he says.

These are the problems that have brought Mrs. Nkom into trouble.

He says he has been threatened several times on the street, and reveals that when he first started law enforcement, he hired bodyguards to protect him.

But his journey to become one of Cameroon’s top law enforcement officials began long before that.

In 1969, at the age of 24, she became the country’s first black female lawyer, having studied in France – a former colonial country – and Cameroon.

She says she was encouraged to continue her studies by her boyfriend at the time, who later became her husband.

His previous legal career was representing the poor and disadvantaged but it was a chance encounter in 2003 that led him to join the fight against gay sex.

He was at the office of the public prosecutor in Douala when he saw a group of young people arrested in pairs, who did not have the courage to look up.

“When I searched the court docket, I found out that he was accused of being a homosexual,” he says.

This angered his views on human rights and he became clear that sexual minorities should be included in the category of people whose rights were protected by law.

“I decided to fight to ensure that these human rights are respected,” added Mrs. Nkom.

He went on to found the Association for the Defense of Homosexuality (Adefho) in 2003.

Since then, he has been involved in many crimes. One of the most famous in recent years was his defense of the famous transgender Shakiro and his partner, Patricia, in 2021.

The pair were arrested while eating in a restaurant and charged with “attempted homosexuality”.

They were sentenced to five years for violating the penal code and insulting people.

“It’s a hammer blow. That’s a lot of time that’s defined in the law. The message is clear: homosexuals have no place in Cameroon,” Ms Nkom said at the time.

Later, Shakiro and Patricia were released on appeal and fled the country.

Since then the LGBT situation has not changed. LGBT activist Sébastien, who runs an organization that supports families with gay children, sees the situation as getting worse.

Last year, a song based on a popular mbolé song with a title and lyrics encouraging people to target and kill homosexuals, was released. It is still widely distributed, and is regularly played in the most popular venues in the country’s major cities.

“People attack us because of this song, which promotes crime,” says Sébastien.

LGBT people are supposed to hide their sexuality but “some people set traps to approach and attack us or report us to the police,” he says.

Ms. Nkom says that Brenda Biya, the daughter of President Paul Biya, came out publicly that she was a prostitute last year, she thought it would help change the law.

Ms Biya – who spends most of her time outside Cameroon – has been quoted as saying that he hopes his openness will change things at home.

Mrs. Nkom sees an opportunity. “I’m using Brenda’s case as an example. Now I have a case that I can bring against the president,” he says.

Loya also asked Biya to do more about LGBT affairs in Cameroon.

“Brenda hasn’t answered me yet, since what I said in the press, but I know she will.”

However, for now he will continue his legal career.

He sees the latest attempt to block his efforts as another obstacle – not enough to do so making him stop the war he has been fighting since 2003.