Is homosexuality natural or a perversion? Why would individuals seek their sexual fantasies amongst same sex individuals? Why would a government slam huge jail terms on offenders, even in the face of international call for caution? Gboyega Alaka and Seun Osemota explored these and more
SIXTEEN years ago, Justin Fashanu, elder brother to Nigerian football prodigy, John Fashanu, hanged himself out of frustration. Himself a fine footballer with exploits in some of England’s top clubs, Justin Fashanu in those dark days capitulated to the humiliation and annihilation resulting from the jeers, taunts and persecution that came with his open declaration of his homosexuality. Those were the days when even the United Kingdom, now leading the battle for the rights of gay people, abhorred homosexuality and her people demonstrated near zero tolerance for anyone who as much as demonstrate the slightest preference for same-sex. Report has it that “the dashing young man” – Justin was indeed dashing – had to go take his life seeing that he had been rejected and disowned by his own brother, his fellow football professionals and even his coach, who couldn’t pass on the opportunity of taunting him. Even the United States, where he ‘fled’ to, offered no succour, as he soon found himself wrestling with unproven charges of sexual assault. In a nutshell, the world became too hot for Justin.
Today, the story may have changed in the United Kingdom, the United States and other western countries, but the heat is not in any way abating in the majority of the republics of the world. Africa, for once, has refused to stoop low and just adopt foreign recommendations to liberalise her position against gay people. So many of the countries have, despite the threats of withdrawal of western loans and grants, even gone ahead to pass damning laws criminalising gay activities; more especially the open display of affection and marriages. Mauritania, Sudan and Somalia, for instance, have laws that make gay activities punishable by death. Uganda, already notorious for its public clampdown on gay people, has also pushed its life imprisonment bill to the final stage, waiting only for the prime minister’s assent. Even Kenya and Zambia, two countries whose economy depend largely on tourists from the western world, have demonstrated extreme intolerance for gay activities, making it illegal and criminal. Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, is the latest to join the fray. President Goodluck Jonathan quietly assented to the bill last week, approving up to 14-year jail term for anyone who openly displays same-sex affection or same-sex marriages.
Incidentally, the Nigerian president seems to have scored a double with this law, as he has for the first time in a long while attracted widespread support, an acclaim from Nigerians from across the broad spectrum of its highly divided and turbo-charged socio-cultural and geo-political set-up. Almost everybody seems to welcome the new law and clampdown. Their argument has largely been based on the fact that homosexuality, whether of the gay or lesbian nature, is foreign to our culture. Like a looming shadow, a good number of them also fear that if left unchecked, the menace of gay activities could spread and affect them directly or indirectly. They fear that it could suddenly become attractive to their children. To them, homosexuality is a perversion that must be stemmed by a drastic action, and they would not for once yield to the other line of argument that homosexuality is or could be a natural tendency to some, if not all those practicing it.
British billionaire, Sir Richard Branson, mid-week declared his plan to embark on a self-appointed mission to speak with African leaders, including Nigeria, to soft pedal on their clampdown. Aside his declaration that “everyone speak out to ensure people are free to love whoever they want,” one important point Branson made is that “politicians passing draconian laws against gay people may discover their own children were born gay. Would they really want to see them locked up for life?”
Therefore, to the average European and American, homosexuality is innate, and quoting Branson again, “we need love and understanding and not punishment” to deal with this situation. Could it therefore be that the larger majority of those condemning gay activities are just too detached and ensconced in their own heterosexual fancy world, to see the truth?
It would be recalled that even Nigeria’s Nobel Laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka, also carpeted the Nigerian lawmakers last year, admonishing them to go back to school, since it seemed they did not know the difference between public and private affairs.
Said Soyinka: “The problem with legislators is that they fail to distinguish between personal bills and interventions in private lives. That is the problem. I see no reason why they should intervene in the private lives of adults. What people do in their bedrooms is no business of mine. It should not be the business of legislators.”
Ropo Ewenla’s position tallies with the revered professor’s position. Ewenla is General Secretary, PEN Nigeria Centre and Assistant Director at the University Media Centre, University of Ibadan, and he pointedly asked the question, “ Who are the Nigerian gay couples seeking marriage? How many gay couples do you know?” To him, the government is exerting scarce energy on non-existent problem and again asked, “How do you go about proferring solutions to a non-existent problem, when our very existence is at the mercy of concrete issues begging for decisive interventions.”
Mrs. Akinola from Oshodi also thinks that the president should have left them alone and just let them be. “Everybody has a right to live their life the way they want. And I believe that what they need more is prayer and not persecution; and hope that one day, they will learn from their mistakes.”
The heat is on
In the wake of the new law, reports are rife that the police have swooped on known gay people, who are being forcefully made to confess and reveal the identities of other gay and lesbians in the society. Observers have also expressed fears that the law would be thoroughly abused in a country notorious for using torture to extract confessions. Shehu Saulawa, a writer with Associated Press based in Bauchi, expressed his fears for the law in a society known for extorting money from victims to allow them get out of jail cells.
Dorothy Aken’Ova, Executive Director of Nigeria’s International Centre for Reproductive Health and Sexual Rights, in an interview with a foreign media midweek, declared that the police have already arrested 38 men and are looking for 168 others.
UK-based Nigerian gay activist and head of UK-based gay rights group, Kaleidoscope International Diversity Trust, Bisi Alimi, fears that the new law will also affect those trying to assist gay people. He told the BBC Newsday programme that ”When you say that services will not be provided, what you’re saying is that HIV services that are catering for men who have sex with men will have to stop.”
Alimi was one of the first Nigerians to have openly declared their gay status, which was also the reason he had to relocate to the United Kingdom.
Not in our culture and heritage
Presidential spokesman and veteran journalist, Reuben Abati, has also lent his voice in the defence of the law. He told Associated Press news agency that “This is a law that is in line with the people’s cultural and religious inclination. So it is a law that is a reflection of the beliefs and orientation of the Nigerian people.”
Innate or perversion
To deal with the controversy, it might be important to start from the point of origin. Is homosexuality innate or perversion? If it is innate and natural, then the western world might just have taken the lead ahead of us, yet again, by requesting the world to go liberal on homosexual antagonism. Conversely, if it is a perversion, then anti-gay governments and people might just be right in condemning it. Some have argued that it is an infringement on people’s human rights, arguing that they have a right to love.
Funmi Ayotade, a self-confessed but now reformed lesbian, in an interview granted The Nation in 2012, contended that homosexuality is neither a western culture nor in-born. She traced the history of how she was introduced to it in her high school days by her teachers.
“It was never (a part of western culture). We have the history in the Bible. There was a Sodom and Gomorrah. The tribe of Benjamites was heavily into it. In the New Testament, Apostle Paul spoke against it. So, intimate disorder is an age-long thing. It has been with us in Africa but we only pretended about it. Some cultures permit it in Africa. In the northern parts of Nigeria, it is believed that wealth is in the anus. It is not an alien culture but a problem associated with man irrespective of tribes and racial divides.”
Going by Ayotade’s confession, it might then seem that it is a tendency borne out of wild sexual escapades and perversion. But what do the medical practitioners say?
The doctors’ angle
Dr Fetus Uriri, a medical doctor with the Military Hospital Yaba, Lagos disagreed. According to him, “the gay culture or homosexuality is not inborn and cannot be natural. It usually results from the pressure of peer group activities and exposure, which might also be described as perversion. One other thing that can lead to it is when a child is born with ambiguous genitalia (that is the male and female organ) and does not know where they belong. In such cases, they embrace whichever sexual life they are exposed to or that catches their fancy. ” Dr Uriri, therefore, submitted that there is no way anyone can be born with homosexual instinct – at least from the medical point of view.
Buttressing his position further, Uriri said any child born into a family or environment where prostitution is the in-thing would always gravitate towards prostitution, especially when poverty is also prevalent.
Corroborating Dr. Uriri, Doctor Williams of Ajayi Hospital, in Ikorodu area of Lagos, stated that “it is not possible for a man to fall in love with another man,” arguing that “those engaged in it are only doing it for the fun of it.” He concluded that anyone found culpable “should be jailed to put a stop to the stupidity.”
What the law says
According to Lagos Lawyer, Mr. Fred Agbaje, “I support the law. And it is going to be fully implementable because it was duly passed by the National Assembly and assented to by the president. A law will be lacking in element of legitimacy if its premises is contrary to the basic tenet of morality and culture. A law will only be illegitimate if it is opposed to the aspiration of the majority of the people. In this case, Nigeria is a society largely known for being religious. Islam and Christianity condemn it, and even the traditional religious practitioners also oppose it. So the law will surely stand.”
Asked what he thinks of people who have argued that it is a private affair in the life of those practising it, Agbaje retorted, “What is making it private? If what you’re doing is right, why don’t you go public with it? Why should you be ashamed of what you believe in if you think it is right? Anything done in the dark has to be bad or it should as well be done in the open. Tell me, which of the over 300 Nigerian tribes and dialects stand for the gay culture?”
Human Rights
Agbaje posited that private affair or no private affair, morality and order is a strong ground to deny or curtail rights under the constitution. “In other words, if your right can in some way affect order and the moral structure of the society, it can be denied or curtailed. Do you know that gay people are publicly attacked and lynched in some countries, in situations that normally lead to a breakdown of law and order? So the government can under that pretext decide to outlaw such expressions in public to forestall such breakdowns.
“The only problem I foresee for the law is that as Nigeria progresses and the pro-gay movement gains ground, it might be subjected to a second review to yield some grounds in the future.”
Mr. Emmanuel, a Barrister at Law from Ouija, lent credence to Barrister Agbaje’s position. Homosexuality is wrong; it is forbidden. He contended that God created Adam and Eve and not Adam and Steve and asked the pointed question, “How can you procreate and multiply if you engage in man-to-man sex? What is the future there?”
He concluded that the law is right and it will help eradicate the gay culture in Nigeria.
