Homosexual activist and attorney Aman Ravindra-Singh has accused Fiji’s Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama of breaking the law by the manner in which he responded to a suggestion the same sex marriage be legalised.
Singh claims that the prime minister has violated section 26 of the Fiji constitution, and he should be charged under the criminal code.
Bainimarama made an off the cuff response after watching a FBC TV programme, broadcast in early in January, ‘Have Your Say’.
The programme which made references to the Constitution, equality and same sex marriage, featured Shamima Ali, the Women’s Crisis Centre co-ordinator.
Ali said after the programme was aired that she last spoke to FBC TV last November and she did not say anything on same sex marriage.
Fiji Sun, reported that Bainimarama said “Tell Shamima Ali, there will be no same sex marriage in Fiji, a topic pushed by NGOs such as hers under the issue of human rights.”
He added: “Not in her lifetime and not in ours.”
“They should not be confused with the wording of the Constitution about the equality and love for one another.”
The Constitution, he stressed, did not refer to equality as the opportunity for same sex marriage or love for all as love by Sakaraia for Ropate ending at the altar.
For a woman who wants to get married to another woman he said: “Go and have it done in Iceland and stay and live there.”
“Fiji does not need that rubbish.”
Jasmine Kaur, founder of the gay activist group Oceania Pride, called the prime minister’s comment hateful and intolerant, and she has called for him to apologize.
“He actually needs to apologize to the LGBTIQ community,” she said. “We need to create a culture of acceptance not (in)tolerance, and that is what I would like him to teach the nation.”
Sexual activity between people of the same sex has been legal in Fiji since 2010. Same-sex marriage, however, has been expressly banned in the country since 2002. (It has been legal in Iceland since 2010.)
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News category: Asia Pacific.
