Open letter... to His Excellency Olusegun Obasanjo

His Excellency Olusegun Obasanjo
President of the Republic
The Presidency
Aso Rock
Abuja
Nigeria

Dear President Obasanjo,

Nigeria – Failure to honour fundamental Human Rights obligations

I am a insert personal information; gender/age/profession/race if you will, presently living in location.

Reason for interest: eg. In recent years, having travelled on several occasions to Africa, I follow international news coverage of events in Nigeria.

Like many international observers, I have been greatly impressed by improvements and progress made under your government, particularly economic reforms to combat corruption introduced by one of your apointees, Mrs Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala. Across the continent and around the world many look to Nigeria, anticipating the country will become the most powerful economy of the continent; the example set by your government is an important one.

I write to express concern that your government proposes legislation that will move Nigeria backwards, failing to protect a vulnerable minority in your own country and damaging your own government’s international standing, by discrimnating against people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgendered.

As you are no doubt aware, the majority of countries in the world have decriminalised homosexuality. All people are equal, and I believe that all governments are obligated to ensure that the human rights of every individual are fully respected, regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity. Laws that criminalise homosexuality act as a licence for discrimination, torture and ill-treatment; the proposed legislation introduced by Minister of Justice Bayo Ojo give official sanction to this behaviour.

I urge your government to act in accordance with Nigeria’s obligations under international and regional human rights law and withdraw this bill. In addition, I ask you to consider repealing Chapter 42 (section 214) of the Nigerian criminal code, and equivalent provisions in the Sharia penal code, to decriminalise homosexuality in line with international human rights standards.

Your government is obligated to ensure that the human rights of every individual in Nigeria are fully respected, regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity. potentially criminalises not only gay men, lesbians and bisexual people in same-sex relationships, but is vague enough to permit the prosecution of individuals for activities such as campaigning for LGBT rights or anyone providing sexual health information or services. No-one should be imprisoned or detained solely for their real or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity for sexual relations in private between consenting adults, or for advocating LGBT rights.

Discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation contradicts fundamental freedoms under the Nigerian Constitution and it is also prohibited under other international human rights treaties to which Nigeria is a state party, in particular the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which affirm the equality of all people.

The proposed legislation could be used to prosecute individuals who are campaigning for this law to be reformed or providing sexual health information or services; this is clearly unjust and detrimental to civil liberties. In particular, it would also impede effective HIV/AIDS prevention efforts in Nigeria, damaging your government’s own work by driving populations already suffering stigma for their sexual conduct further underground, not only making it more difficult for outreach and education efforts to reach them, but potentially criminalising civil society groups engaged in that vital work.

I further call on you to publicly commit to ensuring that national, state and local laws prohibit all forms of discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity. Anyone imprisoned or detained solely for their real or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity should be released immediately and unconditionally, including those detained for consensual sexual relations in private between adults and those held for advocating LGBT rights.

Thank you for your consideration of this letter. I would be very grateful for any response to the concerns I have raised.

Sincerely,