Country Overview
Zambia
At a glance
Same-sex Relations for Men Legal Throughout the Country?
Same-sex Relations for Women Legal Throughout the Country?
Legal Gender Recognition Possible?
LGBTI Orgs Able to Register?
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Zambia maintains the criminalization of same-sex sexual activity through its laws inherited from British colonial rule. Since its independence in 1964, laws concerning homosexuality have remained mainly unchanged, with the inherited penal code amended only once in 1933 and repealed and replaced by Act No. 15 of 2005, which contains similar content. Same-sex sexual activity is proscribed by Sections 155, 156, and 158 of Zambia's penal code. Engaging in "acts against the order of nature" carries a penalty of fifteen years to life in prison. A lesser sentence applies to "indecent practices between persons of the same sex," including "any act of gross indecency" that a man commits with a man under Section 158(1) or that a woman commits with another woman under Section 158(2). In 2024, activists in Zambia filed a constitutional challenge to the laws.
*Outright research indicates that the bodily autonomy of intersex people is not respected and protected in this country.
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