Last week we told you about Maurice Tomlinson, the gay Jamaican man who's gone to the Caribbean Court of Justice to challenge Belize's Immigration law. That law says prostitutes and homosexuals are barred from entering Belize. Tomlinson says that discriminates against him as a CARICOM national and deprives him freedom to travel throughout the region as a CARICOM national. Today Immigration Minister Godwin Hulse said that while the law may be on the books, it's not in practice:.
Hon. Godwin Hulse, Minister of Immigration
"The law is a 1963 law, let's face it. In the heady days of puritanism and all the rest. You know there is this gender policy and one has to be careful what one says. I am never careful with what I say. For me the position is very simple; nobody at immigration is going to ask anybody to declare their sexual orientation and that's not a question coming into the country. So, how on earth are you going to know who is who and who is what to refuse or otherwise allow them entry? There striking it out makes no difference to the law at all."
True to his word, Tomlinson has traveled freely to Belize before.
Email
Print