In 2013, an iconic picture of two ladies
kissing before anti-gay marriage protesters in Marseille, France, went
viral. That act of defiance before an assembly of mostly old ladies was
to demonstrate an inviolable right to private life and choice. It was
largely the fear of this sort of freedom that spurred the Nigerian
Senate to embark on pushing a bill to criminalise activities relating to
homosexuality with draconian measures.
The climax of the saga occurred on
Monday, January 13 when the Special Adviser to President Goodluck
Jonathan on Media and Publicity, Dr. Reuben Abati, announced that the
President had signed the bill into law.
It was a well-calculated move from a
politician who wants to win popular support for 2015 elections, and he
chose a good time to espouse conservative values. Just the previous
week, his party, the Peoples Democratic Party, and the All Progressives
Congress engaged in the usual catfight, this time over religion. Having
whipped up some Islamophobia, he artfully topped it all by riding
on the waves of subsisting moral panic the gay debate generated. For a
man who routinely closes his eyes to corruption and every other
imaginable human vice in his administration, Jonathan’s signing of this
bill is illuminative of his moral values and priority. (By the way,
where was his voice when the debate on child marriage was going on?)
This time, he chose to be Pontius Pilate who delivered a poor prisoner
to a raging mob.
That is not the stuff morally strong folk are made of.
The seeming interference by the West
–specifically the United States — over the issue of same-sex
relationship and its cultural acceptance in this part of the world have
given some relativists a new punch-bag. What people saw as Hillary
Clinton and President Barack Obama’s meddlesomeness quickly gave rise to
a congress of emergency patriots who arrogated upon themselves the
power to erect a perimeter fence around values they alone can decide are
either “African” or not.
These afro-jingoists position Africa as
the bastion of moral values (which, incidentally, always begins and ends
with sex) and insist we maintain a rigid stand against cultural
erosion; that we are a sovereign nation and the white man cannot dictate
to us. Rather than focus on their countrymen who will be affected by
the law, they expend energy yelling at the white man who will not lose
anything in the long run.
This sort of resistance is to be
expected, of course. History teaches us that the people of Calabar had a
similar pushback against Mary Slessor when she began to campaign
against the killing of twins. Today, Nigerians venerate her for her
foresight. When a white District Officer stopped the Elesin Oba culture
in colonial Oyo town, people protested saying a white man had no right
to stop a legitimate cultural practice.
The point is, culture does not mean
people should be stuck in a time warp. Societies advance and that is why
even the most vociferous campaigners for “African values” will not
forsake their European/Arabia-gifted religion for Amadioha or Sango;
will not give up their cellphones (and other forms of western
technology) and return to the villages to communicate with drums and
smoke signals. They will not request a law that forces women to marry as
virgins like it used to be, once upon a time, in Africa. There is no
culture in the world that is immutable. What people call “African
culture” today, cultural scholars have analysed, are largely practices
that are consequences of colonialism.
Nigerians can talk about sovereignty all
day but countries interfere in local affairs as moral conscience of
other countries. For both the Holocaust and the Rwandan genocide, taking
the stand of “sovereignty” was as immoral. Either as individuals or as a
nation, “The West” has intervened in Africa frequently: in wars, in
education, during famines and till now they still dish us billions of
dollars in aid and relief. Bill Gates, on his blog, posts pictures and
notes of his philanthropic activities in Africa’s poor places and not
one African leader has ever kicked him out in the name of sovereignty.
To be an independent nation goes beyond
yelling against the white man’s intrusive ways. It comes with
obligations and one of them is protecting the minority from the
repressive might of the majority.
That is the sort of moral responsibility
that President Jonathan should have displayed rather than take the
populist route of offering up gays as scapegoats to be slaughtered to
one of the gods we worship in Nigeria –hypocrisy. In a country where
freedom and human rights are barely guaranteed most people, why expose
minorities to hate and its consequences?
Prior to the time the likes of Senators
Oluremi Tinubu, Domingo Obende and about 24 others proposed the bill in
2011 to stem the cultural tide rising from the West, gays in Nigeria
were not agitating to be married. They were not requesting that the law
defining marriages as heterosexual relationships in Nigeria be amended.
No, the move was mimicry; since Oyinbo lawmakers were debating homosexuality, Nigerians lawmakers must do so too.
That copycat attitude was an annoying
form of reactivism to an issue they obviously barely understood beyond
its aesthetics. Most of the debaters had neither profound arguments nor
made historical analyses to tender beyond throwing out their religious
definition of morality everywhere. In Nigeria, when people bring out
their holy books during an argument, good luck to reason. It was not
surprising the debate did not go far.
I had hoped Jonathan would at least
refrain from touching the bill and concentrate on the corruption
crippling his government; he would have focused on providing
electricity. He should also stop giving recycled speeches every time his
hand grasps a microphone. But no, he had to capitulate. One day, he
will look back and realise he fell on the wrong side of history.
Finally, at whatever personal risk under
this obnoxious law, I reiterate my unflinching support for sexual
minorities in Nigeria –lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgenders. I
believe nobody should suffer discrimination based on their gender,
sexual orientation, ethnicity, nationality, race and whatever identity
with which they are labelled. I believe in equality and I wish to state
that unequivocally.
And for those who are about to wonder, yes, this is my religion.
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