In 2006, Cameroon was rocked by an anti-gay crusade when some tabloids beamed their searchlight on more than 50 of the country´s prominent figures for homosexuality. The denunciation campaign against homosexuality set in motion a furious national debate on gay rights in the country. This paper examines the Cameroon government´s ambivalence to LGBT relationships and the simultaneous entanglement of same-sex relationships with power and social mobility. Same-sex relationships involving the powerful, is part of human rights—“the right to a private life”. However, when it involves the poor, it is criminalized, and considered as a threat to national identity and sovereignty. Homosexual relationships by the former are reportedly intertwined with occultic powers and serve as a gateway to social mobility in the country´s sociopolitical landscape. Framed in terms of African nationalism—a national identity inscribed on women´s bodies since they are charged with biological reproduction, the public resistance of Cameroon´s leaders to same-sex relationships is a veil to produce a counter hegemonic discourse against the perceived intrusion of western values as well as to deflect Western attention from profligacy, human rights violations, long stays in power, and unbridled corruption. Cast against the anti-democracy discourse of the 1990s, the anti-same-sex discourse feeds into larger narratives about resistance to perceived western values and the double appropriation of political homophobia by various social actors.