Since February 2026, Senegal has embarked on a violent campaign on homosexuality. Between February and now, dozens of people have been arrested and a teenager was killed on accusations of being gay.
Senegal’s anti-gay crackdown through its headlines
We analyzed 900 Senegalese news headlines about the anti-gay crackdown. Here’s how local media is covering it.
ScrollThis clampdown which culminated in a new anti-homosexuality law has equally been heavily mediated.
We were curious about how local media was covering the crackdown and so we decided to find out.
Using MediaCloud, we collected and analyzed 900 news headlines published between January 1 and April 15 2026. These were pulled using multiple queries across English and French terms such as “homosexual” and “homosexuel.”
We developed a codebook of three frames through an initial manual review of the dataset. We then identified 150 high-confidence calibration examples, headlines that clearly and unambiguously exemplified specific frames, and used these to guide LLM-assisted classification of the full dataset via Claude Sonnet 4.6.
Of the 900 headlines analyzed, 289 were coded as not relevant to LGBT discourse — stories where homosexuality or LGBT keywords appeared incidentally in article body text but were not the focus of the headline or story. The substantive analysis draws on the remaining 611 headlines. Following the classification by the model, we manually reviewed a subset of the results before proceeding to analysis. Here’s what we found.
01
Gay people are framed as a public health threat.
13% of relevant coverage, more than 1 in every 10 stories, uses the language of public health emergency.
HIV status, infection, and voluntary transmission are used to cast homosexuality as a danger spreading through society.
This places homosexuality inside a public health register that demands state intervention and medical surveillance.
Sample headlines
“Atteints du SIDA, ils violent une jeune fille à tour de rôle”
With AIDS, they take turns raping a young girl.
“La graine du VIH est aujourd'hui semée”
The seed of HIV has been planted today.
“Près de la moitié des homosexuels à Dakar seraient porteurs du VIH”
Nearly half of gay people in Dakar are said to carry HIV.
“Transmission volontaire du VIH : Nouvelles Graves Révélations Sur Pierre Robert”
Voluntary HIV transmission: shocking new revelations.
01
Gay people are framed as a public health threat.
13% of relevant coverage, more than 1 in every 10 stories, uses the language of public health emergency.
HIV status, infection, and voluntary transmission are used to cast homosexuality as a danger spreading through society.
This places homosexuality inside a public health register that demands state intervention and medical surveillance.
Senegal has forcefully subjected scores of people to HIV tests since February and publicly disclosed results.
Headline
“Atteints du SIDA, ils violent une jeune fille à tour de rôle”
With AIDS, they take turns raping a young girl.
SeneNews
Headline
“La graine du VIH est aujourd'hui semée”
The seed of HIV has been planted today.
SeneNews
Headline
“Près de la moitié des homosexuels à Dakar seraient porteurs du VIH”
Nearly half of gay people in Dakar are said to carry HIV.
Senego
Headline
“Transmission volontaire du VIH : Nouvelles Graves Révélations Sur Pierre Robert”
Voluntary HIV transmission: shocking new revelations.
Rewmi
Headline
“150 Enfants Et Homosexuels Mariés Infectés Par Le Sida”
150 children and married homosexuals infected with AIDS.
Rewmi
Headline
“Sur ordre de Pierre Robert, voici comment les homosexuels propageaient le SIDA au Sénégal”
On the orders of Pierre Robert, here is how gay people were spreading AIDS across Senegal.
SeneNews
Headline
“Un détenu porteur du VIH avoue avoir multiplié les rapports non protégés depuis 2021”
An HIV-positive detainee confesses to unprotected sex repeatedly since 2021.
IGFM
02
Gay people are described as a criminal network.
27% of relevant coverage, more than 1 in every 4 stories, frames homosexuality as a coordinated criminal enterprise with leaders, recruits, territories, and digital infrastructure.
Investigators are portrayed as dismantling networks the way they would dismantle a drug cartel. Citizens are encouraged to surveil each other.
More than 60 people have been arrested as part of this “network.”
Sample headlines
“Un réseau d'homosexuels démantelé, la traque s'étend jusqu'à Dakar...”
A gay network dismantled, the hunt extends to Dakar.
Dakaractu
“l'exploitation de WhatsApp et TikTok mène à Sandra”
How WhatsApp and TikTok led investigators to Sandra.
Thiès Info
“Groupes secrets, Réseaux infiltrés, sextapes et pseudonymes”
Secret groups, infiltrated networks, sex tapes and fake names.
Dakaractu
“De nouveaux homosexuels cernés, comment la Brigade de Recherches a encore frappé au coeur de la mafia”
New gay people surrounded — how the Research Brigade struck again at the heart of the mafia.
SeneNews
“Affaire réseau homosexuels: Filet serré à Saint-Louis, la traque s'intensifie, le réseau s'effondre pièce par pièce”
Homosexual network affair: The net tightens in Saint-Louis, the hunt intensifies, the network collapses piece by piece.
Dakaractu
“Les enquêteurs ont piégé le 3e réseau, la liste dévoilée, voici les personnes arrêtées”
Investigators trap the 3rd network, the list revealed, here are the people arrested.
SeneNews
03
Celebrity scandal is used to name and expose suspected gay people.
47% of relevant coverage, nearly 1 in every 2 stories, uses the arrest of a high-profile television presenter as a searchlight.
That searchlight sweeps outward, pulling musicians, TikTokers, journalists, stylists, and public officials into view.
The coverage creates the emotional conditions under which audiences expect, and even demand, more revelation.
Sample headlines
“Pape Cheikh Diallo de la lumière aux ténèbres, chronique d'une descente aux enfers”
Pape Cheikh Diallo from light to darkness, chronicle of a descent into hell.
SeneNews
“Soupçons de couleurs LGBT au concert de Mia Guissé: l'expertise visuelle de JAMRA livre sa conclusion finale”
Suspicions of LGBT colors at Mia Guissé's concert: JAMRA's visual expertise delivers its final conclusion.
Senego
“Ils vont aussi être arrêtés: ces autres célébrités impliquées dans l'affaire des homosexuels”
They will also be arrested: these other celebrities implicated in the gay affair.
SeneNews
“Arrestation de Kader, chroniqueur de Sen TV, dans l'affaire des prévenus homosexuels”
Arrest of Kader, Sen TV commentator, in the suspects case.
IGFM
“Affaire des prévenus homosexuels: le 2e adjoint au maire de Ouakam placé en garde à vue par la BR de Keur Massar”
Gay suspects case: the deputy mayor of Ouakam placed in police custody by the Keur Massar Research Brigade.
IGFM
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These translations are auto-generated by Claude, so they may be inaccurate and can contain errors. Please verify.