Queer Namibians pin hopes on progressive court ruling as Parliament moves to curtail rights
A High Court ruling in June is expected to overturn the colonial-era sodomy law that is used to police and discriminate against the queer community.
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Namibian LGBTQ+ advocates hope a High Court ruling next month will decriminalise gay sex by overturning the colonial-era sodomy law, offering a ray of hope even as parliament tries to crack down on same-sex relationships.
“The courts (are) our last hope and our beacon of liberation,” Omar van Reenen, who is co-founder of the rights group Equal Namibia, told Context in an interview.
LGBTQ+ advocate Friedel Dausab brought the appeal against Namibia’s long-standing sodomy law, arguing the criminalisation of sodomy and related offences was unconstitutional. Arguments were heard in October and the court is expected to rule in June.
The court decision comes at a crucial time, in a year in which Namibia has seen a number of fatal hate crimes and two parliamentary bills seeking to limit LGBTQ+ rights, said van Reenen, who lives in the southern African country's second-largest city, Walvis Bay.
Though parliament passed both new bills, they are currently awaiting presidential approval to be passed into law.
Despite Namibia being seen by many in the West as a “poster child for democracy and rule of law”, van Reenen said the two bills aimed to further marginalise LGBTQ+ Namibians, but had not had the same attention as similar measures in Uganda and Ghana.
Uganda's Anti-Homosexuality Act, which was signed into law...
