So the New Year has started off very well for the LGBTQ community of Belize as their Court of Appeals has just unanimously upheld a 2016 ruling that a ban on gay sex is unconditional. And about time too,
The law making homosexuality illegal dates back to the old days long ago when the island was still part of the British Empire and known as British Honduras. The country gained independence in 1981 BUT it is still a parliamentary constitutional monarchy and has structure of government .based on the British parliamentary system,. Their legal system is still modelled on the common law of England, and although this may be hard for non-Brits to understand, BUT our Queen Elizabeth II, also still holds the title Queen of Belize.
The Court has now ruled that Section 53 of the country’s criminal code, which dubbed same-sex desire as “against the order of nature”, was found to go against five sections of the constitution.
The Country still has a very long way to go to get equal rights for the LGBTQ Community (there is after all still a Law on their Statute Books that has not been enforced for years, but technically bans all gay visitors from overseas), but this is a great first step for the next decade.
Labels: 2020, Belize, equal rights
