Kito: the set-up
Kito is the Nigerian word for it. Someone matches with you on an app or messages you on Facebook. They are charming, they are eager, they want to meet today. The address is a house you do not know. Inside are four men, a phone recording, and a demand: money, your family's numbers, your bank app, or the video goes to your church. Sometimes there is a beating. Sometimes worse. It is the single most common thing that happens to gay men in Nigeria, and the reason it works is that the victim cannot go to the police.
- Never meet at their place first. A public place in daylight: a mall, a fast-food restaurant, a busy junction. If they refuse, that is your answer.
- Video call before you meet. A real person will show their face. A kito account will make excuses.
- Tell one person where you are going and who you are meeting, with a screenshot. Set a time to check in.
- Do not go with money, a bank app, or your main phone. Carry an old phone with nothing on it.
- Trust the feeling. If the story changes, if the address moves, if a friend is suddenly coming too, leave. Rudeness is cheaper than what follows.
If you are blackmailed
- Do not pay. Paying proves the threat works and the demand never ends. Almost every person who paid was asked again.
- Do not send more photos, more information, more names. Stop responding.
- Screenshot everything, then block. Keep the evidence somewhere safe, off your main phone.
- Tell one person you trust, before the blackmailer tells someone for you. A secret that is already told cannot be sold.
- Call the support line. We have walked people through this many times and we know which threats are real.
Your phone
In Nigeria your phone is the evidence against you. Police at a checkpoint will ask for it and go through it. A stranger who takes it in a kito will go through it. Your family may.
- Use a lock code, not a fingerprint or face, and never a pattern.
- Keep no intimate photos on the device. None. Not in a hidden folder, not in a vault app.
- Use apps with disappearing messages and turn off notification previews.
- Save contacts under ordinary names. Save this support line under something harmless.
- Know that you can refuse to unlock your phone, and know that in practice refusing may cost you. Decide in advance what you would do.
Police
- Stay calm and polite. Give your name. You do not have to explain your life.
- Do not admit to anything. Do not sign anything without a lawyer.
- Ask for a lawyer. Say the words. TIERs in Lagos and other groups have lawyers who have handled these arrests.
- If they are demanding money, the honest advice is that most people pay to get out, and that this is extortion, not law. Get out first, then report to a human rights group.
If you are put out of your home
- Take documents, medication, a charger, and any money you can, before the door closes. Everything else can be replaced.
- Go to the one person you decided in advance you could go to. Every gay Nigerian should have that person chosen before the day comes.
- Call the support line. A night's guest house money is exactly what we try to keep in reserve.
- Do not go back the same night. Anger cools. Go back, if you go back, with someone.
Online
- Use a different name and a photo that does not show your face on apps.
- Turn off location on dating apps; they can be used to map you.
- Assume any message can be screenshotted and sent to your pastor. Write accordingly.
- Never send money to anyone you met online, for any reason, including a visa, a modelling job or an emergency.
Afterwards
Whatever was done to you, it was not your fault and it was not a judgement. Get medical care within seventy-two hours if you may have been exposed to HIV; a clinic can give you post-exposure prophylaxis, PEP, that prevents infection if started in time. The HIV help page explains where. Then, when you are ready, tell it to one person. Then, if you want, to me.