Senegalese police have launched an inquiry into an alleged homosexual attack on a young guy.
A video circulating on social media since Tuesday, according to the police, shows a guy being manhandled by a mob yelling homophobic comments at him.
The video went viral on Tuesday evening, following a backlash over Senegalese international Idrissa Gana Gueye’s reported refusal to join the battle against homophobia by wearing a rainbow shirt during a match in France.
Idrissa Gana Gueye, who has been chastised in France, has gotten widespread backing in Senegal, notably on Tuesday from President Macky Sall.
An irate crowd of dozens of guys surrounds a young man in broad daylight, barefoot and wearing only boxers, in various videos shared on Youtube and TikTok.
“Homosexuality will not be tolerated in Senegal,” the mob chanted. Slaps are given to his back and head, and he is held tightly by his wrists with a drip of blood on his shoulders.
“You, as a gay, decide to have a partner with all these women at your disposal. Let us assassinate him before the cops arrive “Wolof is spoken in one video. The audience screams, “He doesn’t deserve to live.”
In one of the films, a throng gathers outside a police station in the HLM neighborhood of Dakar’s capital, shouting the same slurs.
On condition of anonymity, a police official at the station told AFP journalists on Wednesday that the young man had been taken there the day before.
Homosexuality is typically regarded deviant in this 95 percent Muslim country. The law punishes so-called “unnatural actions with a person of the same sex” with one to five years in prison.
