Malawi Police save male prostitute from mob justice

Malawi Police in Lilongwe on Sunday saved a male prostitute from mob justice after a man who had lured him into sex realized he was male when they had gone into a room.

Police in Lilongwe confirmed the arrest of Limbane Kukhase who was whisked away as a mob were administering vigilante justice on him as punishment for being a male sex worker and gay.

Kukhase had a female like make up on his face and dressed like a woman when he went at some drinking joints at Kagwa in Lilongwe’s Area 49 where he met a libido man who, out of drunkenness, did not realize that he was courting a male.

After arriving in a room where they were supposed to have sex, the libidos man realized that he had wrongly courted another man for sex and shouted for help.

In no time, people arrived and started beating the bi-sexual man before police from neighbouring Kanengo were called in and was whisked away.

He has since been released without any charge and the police say he was picked up for his own safety.

Centre for the Development of People (Cedep)  executive director Gift Trapence has meanwhile  asked police officers to provide access to justice and protection to sexual minorities such as lesbians, gays and transgender people.

The minority rights organisation has embarked on an access to justice project whose objectives are to empower the gay community on their right to seek formal and informal justice and security from the police and other institutional bodies if their rights are violated.

Cedep  said it has recorded over 100 cases of assault on the gay community in 2014 and a slight increase in 2015.

The  cases were not reported to police because the sexual minority community did not trust to take up their case because homosexuality is illegal in Malawi, according to Trapence.