Nigeria’s anti-gay marriage bill currently under debate in the National Assembly has brought concern to international rights activists, saying it is against modern trends.

The executive members of government presented the bill to the house of representatives on 30 March and asked for its approval.

The bill is titled “Same Sex Marriage Prohibition Act 2006”.

The bill provides for five years of imprisonment to anybody who “goes through the ceremony of marriage with a person of the same sex” or who “performs, witnesses, aids or abets” such ceremonies.

It also advocates the same penalty to any individual engaged in public or in private, in any form of advocacy or association supporting the rights of gays, lesbians, bisexuals or transgenders.

I'm sorry, this is deranged. As the Nigerian government debates a bill to demonize gays, Friday Okonofua is the kind of "expert" showing up at public hearings. (The Tide Online [Nigeria]):

--"A mom catches her little boy playing with himself in the bathroom, and says 'if you keep doing that you'll go blind!'
The boy thinks a minute and says 'can I do it until I need glasses?'

The Deputy Senate President, Senator Ibrahim Nasir Mantu (Plateau State) who spoke after the Senate Leader said that he would have throught that the government would devote more time to "do things more important to the lives of our country than for it to propose this Bill.

"What the government is now doing is creating awareness to this thing and for us to create this kind of awareness, people may now want to start exploring it. Mr. President we have more serious things to do than to be working on this bill, I therefore urge that members should help me to kill this bill". Senate Chief Whip, Senator Udoma Udo Udoma supported Mantu and argued that "When you pass a law, it is meant to deal with a problem. My view is that the marriage act that we operate in Nigeria defines marriage as a union between a man and a woman. As the deputy Senate President said, I think we should set this aside so that we can concentrate on the more important things we have to do".

Senator Daisy Danjuma (Edo South) said: "This is not an issue here right now. It is such countries that issues like this have been discussed in Parliament that it is an issue. The problems we should face now are national issues concerning us; this is not an issue for now. We should not make an issue and give it the relevance it does not deserve".

The truth is that evil men abound everywhere, the US not an exception, and the NGOs not ruled out. It must be made clear that the fact that Human Rights Watch is based in the United States of America does not mean that the US as a people, or a government, share the opinions and agenda of the group.

We must make haste to inform our people how these NGOs or agencies operate. Just as some rich individuals are insane and cut up humans to please themselves, there are rich people who set up agencies to cause evil and harm. One would imagine what some people gain by working hard to discover viruses and pump them in the internet to cause havoc. Evil men have the resources to do anything.

I will not, however, refrain from more than a touch of schadenfreude regarding the statements about HRW

LONDON, March 29, 2007 – While the draconian Same Sex Marriage (Prohibition) Bill 2006 appears to be ‘stalled in the Nigerian House of Representative – the lower house of the country’s parliament, there will be no celebrations in the gay community just yet.

There is some confusion as to whether the House had last week gone into recess prior to next month’s Federal elections – AllAfrica.com reported on Sunday that the recess was due to commence yesterday (March 28 ), while the Nigerian press itself was reporting that the recess started over a week ago.

Thursday, 29 March 2007

by Davis Mac-Iyalla


For immediate release

Many people have been asking whether the Same Sex Marriage (Prohibition) Act 2006 which was debated on 22 March by the Nigerian House of Representatives is likely to be lost if the Nigerian election takes place soon.

The Nigerian Federal elections are scheduled to be held on 21 April and the ceremonial opening of the new session of Parliament on May 29, 2007, which the constitution recognizes as the hand over date to a new government. Allafrica.com reported on Sunday, 25 March 2007 that the House of Representatives will be prorogued on Wednesday, 28 March but this has not been confirmed by other sources. If the election takes place as timetabled, the present House of Representatives will be officially dissolved in May and the handover to the new House will take place.

The present sitting of the House has finished, and they asked the panel of Human Rights which continues to meet, to go and review the bill again. It is difficult to say categorically that the current House has been totally suspended because a lot of manoeuvring is taking place ahead of the election. It may be reasonably safe to assume the bill has been abandoned for now.

What we are hearing from CAN members in Anglican congregations in Nigeria is that the church leaders have been feeling big pressure on them and some are very angry because they expected the bill to be voted on prior to the end of this session. There are also rumours that money has exchanged hands, American money, and yet it has not proved easy for the Anglican Church leaders to push the bill through the House of Representatives. Corruption remains widespread at every level of Nigerian society.

It is also theoretically possible for the next government to reintroduce the bill. This would be unlikely to happen in the first term when they would be trying to satisfy many different expectations. It remains a possibility that the bill could be reintroduced in the next government’s second term.

Davis Mac-Iyalla, Director of Changing Attitude Nigeria, said today (29 March):

“Because of the continuing uncertainty, Changing Attitude Nigeria will not celebrate the defeat of the bill publicly until after May 29. We are quietly confident and feeling more happy, but there is still the potential for lobbying in favour of the bill to take place by the Church of Nigeria and for the Government to spring a surprise. However, if the Church was confident about the success of the bill, we think they would be issuing a confident public statement now, which they are not.”

BRUSSELS, March 29, 2007 – The Council of the European Union is backing the European Parliament’s call on the Nigerian authorities not to adopt the proposed law reinforcing a ban on same-sex relations already in force in Nigeria in its current form.

...

“It is excellent that the Council and the European Parliament are both speaking with clarity and unity,” Michael Cashman, President of the Intergroup on Gay and Lesbian Rights replied.

“We now just need to make sure that the Nigerians take our opinion seriously and are continually reminded that the proposal of any such laws would necessarily have a negative impact on our relations under the Cotonou Agreement.”

I'm not at all sure that Mr. Cashman is right on this point. I would say that it is of somewhat more importance to just make sure that Europe takes it's own opinions seriously. After this is assured, then the Council and the European Parliament might spare some thought to whether others take them seriously.

AS part of preparations for Easter celebration, we got the national vice president of the Christian Association of Nigeria, CAN, Bishop Mike Okonkwo, to speak on the significance of the annual Christian festival and on very crucial national issues including the forthcoming general elections. Like many other clerics in the country, Okonkwo, who is also the presiding bishop of The Redeemed Evangelical Mission, TREM, believes that there is the dire need for every Nigerian to pray for a successful transition programme. Excerpts:

SAME sex marriage

The CAN president, Most Rev Pater Jasper Akinola of the Anglican Communion, is an unrepentant advocate of the abolition of such a thing. Not just in Nigeria but even outside the country, he has been championing that cause that same sex marriage must never be accepted. So, we are already talking to some of our Christian brethren even in the National Assembly that the Bill on Same Sex Marriage should be thrown out. Our cherished African family values must not be destroyed. The fact that they are doing it in other nations of the world does not make it right. The Bible is very clear. God made male and female. So it is an abomination and we are doing everything within our power; even discussing the Bill in the National Assembly to ensure that such a bill does not come through.

The Commonwealth Games was founded under its original name, the British Empire Games, in 1930. The Games are held every four years, giving around 5,000 athletes from the Commonwealth of Nations to compete in Olympic sports.

The Commonwealth Games Federation constitution dictates that "there shall be no discrimination against any country or person on any grounds whatsoever including race, colour, gender, religion or politics" in Article 7.

The CGF website also claims that "Underlying every decision made by the CGF are three core values - HUMANITY, EQUALITY AND DESTINY."

Nigerian law directly contradicts this, stating that anyone who has "carnal knowledge of any person against order of nature or permits a male to have carnal knowledge of him" can be imprisoned for 14 years.

The Nigerian government is also in the process of bringing in the Same Sex Marriage (Prohibition) Act, under which anyone who "performs, witnesses, aids or abets the ceremony of same sex marriage" or is involved "publicly or privately in positive representation of or for same sex relationships" can be imprisoned for five years.

Sharia law is upheld in many northern states of Nigeria. This dictates that gay people should be stoned to death.

Though Abuja is not one of these states, the issue has still given cause for concern.

Mike Hooper, the chief executive of the CGF told The Guardian that the matter will be dealt during the selection process.

He said: "As to the final decision-making of our membership and whatever issues they take into account and how they cast their vote - that is a matter for them."

Eighteen men have been arrested in northern Nigeria for alleged sodomy, which carries the death sentence under Bauchi state's Islamic sharia law, the official NAN news agency reported Thursday.

Judge Malam Tanimu ordered the 18 remanded in prison until a further hearing on August 21 following their arrest on Sunday in a hotel in Bauchi city.

The court on Wednesday heard that the men, who were wearing female clothing, had come to the city from five neighbouring states to celebrate a gay "marriage".

The orisha Oshún (a major river is named after her in central Nigeria) technically presides over gay men, Oyá over lesbians and Óbba over their unions.