News
2007-01-23
Activists fight
antigay Nigerian law
Nigeria seems
certain to legislate one of the world's most sweeping and
repressive antigay laws unless international pressure is
bought
Nigeria seems
certain to legislate one of the world's most sweeping and
repressive antigay laws unless international pressure is
bought to bear on the Nigerian government in the next
few weeks, according to Peter Tatchell of the
London-based LGBT rights group OutRage!
"We appeal to gay
and human rights groups worldwide to take urgent
action to press the Nigerian government to uphold
international human rights law and to drop this
draconian legislation," Tatchell said in a statement
that called the bill being debated in Abuja's parliament
"the most comprehensively homophobic legislation ever
proposed in any country in the world."
The law, approved
by the Federal Executive Council and now before the
National Assembly, levies a five-year automatic prison
sentence not only on almost every expression of gay
identity and sexuality but also on giving advice or
support to lesbians or gay men.
Backed by
Nigerian religious leaders including Anglican archbishop
Peter Akinola, to whom several U.S. churches upset
with the Episcopal Church's tolerance of gays have
switched allegiance, it is expected to be passed into
law within weeks.
On Friday retired
South African archbishop Desmond Tutu once again
decried the antigay stance taken by some African Anglican
leaders and urged them to concentrate on the
continent's problems.
"To penalize
somebody for their sexual orientation is the same as
what used to happen to black South Africans for something
about which we could do nothing," the South African
Press Association quoted Tutu as saying.
Among other
things, Tatchell said, Nigeria's proposed law "will
outlaw membership of a gay group, attending a gay meeting or
protest, advocating gay equality, donating money to a
gay organization, hosting or visiting a gay Web site,
the publication or possession of gay safer-sex advice,
renting or selling a property to a gay couple, expressions
of same-sex love in letters or e-mails, attending a
same-sex marriage or blessing ceremony, screening or
watching a gay movie, taking or possessing photos of a
gay couple, and publishing, selling, or loaning a gay
book or video."
Homosexuality is
already illegal under Nigerian civil law and carries the
death penalty in the northern regions of the country that
are governed by Muslim Sharia law. (Stewart Who?,
UK/Gay.com)
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