Tiny African victory: Seychelles repeals ban on gay sex
The island nation of Seychelles today fulfilled a promise it made five years ago to repeal its anti-gay law.
The unenforced law provided for prison sentences of up to 14 years for same-sex intimacy between men.
By this blog’s count, that action drops to 78 the total number of countries worldwide with laws against same-sex intimacy.
A member of the African Union, Seychelles is located in the Indian Ocean northeast of Madagascar.
Seychelles, with a population of about 92,000, is the third African country in recent years that has decriminalized homosexuality. Mozambique, on the southeastern coast of Africa, with a population of 24 million, did so in 2014. The tiny nation of São Tomé and Príncipe, in the Atlantic Ocean off the shores of central Africa, dropped its anti-LGBT law in 2012.
The newspaper Today in Seychelles reported the news on its front page under the headline “Homosexuality decriminalised.” The repeal was approved in an open vote of the National Assembly.
Seychelles had committed itself to repeal in a statement to the U.N. Human Rights Commission in 2011.
Despite its old anti-gay law, which has remained on the books since the Seychelles were part of the British Empire, the country is relatively tolerant of LGBTI people and has a law that prohibits discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. A same-sex wedding was conducted in Seychelles on June 13, 2015, on British territory (the British high commissioner’s residence).
Pink News reported that Seychelles Foreign Affairs Secretary Barry Faure noted pressures from the UK government: “Seychelles was committed in 2011 to review the law on homosexuality and this had not been done and Britain questions us saying that we have not made progress on this issue.”
Ronny Govinden, attorney general of the Seychelles, said that international pressure had been a factor in the decision, Pink News reported. He said, “It is a priority for the country because whenever the Seychelles is participating in an international convention… we face pressures from other countries who are asking us to remove this law.”
Related articles:
- Seychelles repeals colonial-era law banning gay sex (May 18, 2016, Pink News)
- Seychelles: Same-sex wedding, but anti-gay law remains (76crimes.com)
- Two tiny nations drop anti-gay laws: Palau and Sao Tome (76crimes.com)
- 12 grim lands, 7 bright spots in LGBTI preview of 2015 (76crimes.com)
Progress. Every step counts.