Fighting for LGBTQ Rights in Kenya

Homosexuality is illegal in Kenya, as it is in more than half of African countries. But public attitudes have begun to shift. According to Pew Research Center data from 2002, only 1 percent of Kenyan respondents said society should accept homosexuality. As of 2020, 14 percent believed homosexuality should be accepted. On today’s episode of the Hidden Economics of Remarkable Women, we follow the key people driving this change. Reporter Eunice Maina interviews women and nonbinary LGBTQ activists such as Marylize Biubwa, the co-founder of Queer Republic, and Ivy Werimba, a communications officer at Galck+, a coalition of 16 membership-based LGBTQ+ organizations from across Kenya. Then host Reena Ninan speaks with Eric Gitari, the co-founder of the National Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission in Kenya. His litigation has helped bring recent LGBTQ policy victories. The Hidden Economics of Remarkable Women is supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Roberta Buffett Institute for Global Affairs at Northwestern University. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Om Podcasten

A Foreign Policy series about women creating change through economic empowerment, hosted by Reena Ninan. This season, we are focusing all our stories on girls. What are the real economics of girlhood? What are the hidden costs? And how could girls actually shake up the global economy? We visit girls preventing child marriages in India, advocates who helped legalize abortion in Benin, LGBTQ+ activists in Kenya, and education innovators, among others. HER♀️ is a Foreign Policy production made possible in part through funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.