At least 22 African countries – former colonies of the Belgians, British, Dutch, French and Portuguese – retain domestic laws that make ‘vagrancy’ illegal and equip the police with excessive detention powers in respect of vagrants.

Activists say that these laws criminalise poor, homeless or unemployed individuals. Hawkers, street vendors, petty traders, street children, beggars, sex workers, members of the LGBTQI+ community and drug users are among those who are routinely picked up and detained under such legislation. ‘Currently, vagrancy laws […] largely criminalise the state of homelessness and poverty and are discriminatory to persons with mental health challenges [as well as] sexual minorities’, says Beth Michoma, an advocate of the High Court of Kenya. She adds that in some states, such laws ‘have been used to criminalise political dissidence under the guise of public order’.

Read full article: Poverty: African vagrancy laws continue to discriminate, despite court victories