KITO, JUNGLE JUSTICE AND THE RULE OF LAW: VIOLENCE AGAINST SEXUAL MINORITIES IN NIGERIA

This article examines “kito”, the Nigerian term for schemes in which people, most often gay and bisexual men, are lured through social media or dating applications into meetings where they are assaulted, filmed, robbed and blackmailed, and in some cases killed. It places kito within the wider Nigerian phenomenon of “jungle justice”. The study is a desk-based, qualitative inquiry that combines doctrinal legal analysis with ethical and theological reflection. It draws on the 1999 Constitution, the Same-Sex Marriage (Prohibition) Act 2013 and regional human rights instruments; reports by Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and the European Union Agency for Asylum; investigative journalism and police statements; documented cases; and Nigerian and international scholarship. It conducted no interviews, located no court judgments on kito, and treats unproven accounts as allegations. The article argues that kito combines moral vigilantism with organised crime; that it is sustained by a criminal-law environment that deters victims from reporting, by social stigma and by financial incentives, making it hard for victims to report of the case; and that it cannot be defended on legal, ethical or religious grounds. It does not defend any sexual lifestyle. It defends human life, due process and the rule of law. It recommends that police should investigate kito as ordinary crime and separate the reporting of a crime from any inquiry into the complainant’s identity; that legislators address mob violence and review the breadth of the Act; that researchers build reliable national data; and that religious leaders publicly reject violence, entrapment and extortion.