The Haitian Senate has passed a bill that would ban same-sex marriage and prohibit any promotion of the LGBT+ community.
Despite the fact that same-sex marriage is not legal in the country, the new law would see LGBT+ people could face up to three years in prison and a fine of $8,000US for ‘attempted marriage’.
Charlot Jeudy is the leader of Kouraj—the only LGBT+ activist group in Haiti—and said the senators who voted for the bill were openly "expressing their homophobia".
“The entire LGBT community in Haiti is concerned about the latest attacks on us. The proposed ban on same-sex marriage in Haiti is wasted time, since the law does not recognise same-sex marriage, now what they want to do is penalise it,” Jeudy told the Sentinel.
Jeudy has created a petition in the hopes of halting the bill from moving on to the Chamber of Deputies and then the President of the Republic to become law.
If passed, the law would prohibit gay marriage as well as any public demonstrations held in support of the LGBT+ community—and would apply to both locals and tourists.
“We have the right to protest and we have the right to be who we are and we have the right to be free,” Jeudy said in an interview with AFP.
A Pride festival was planned in Port-au-Prince in September last year but was cancelled after opposition from the government and homophobic threats from the public.
