大象传媒

Why is it OK to be gay in the UK but not in Zambia? In 1967, a turning point for the gay rights movement in the UK, England and Wales decriminalised sex between men. Fifty years on, four out of five British people say they have no problem with homosexuality. Yet it remains a taboo and a crime in many former British colonies, including Zambia.

What brought about the change in the UK and why it has not happened in Zambia, which largely inherited the British legal system?

The UK case raises significant questions about the law and whether it exists to reflect existing public attitudes or to change them. Jo Fidgen discovers how the debate moved from grudging tolerance of homosexuality in the 1960s to a discussion of rights and equality in the 1980s. She hears about the impact of homosexuals playing an increasingly prominent role in cultural life and how the Aids crisis forced the establishment to accept that it had to work with organisations representing gay people.

Despite the greater urgency in Zambia of addressing HIV/Aids than in 1980s Britain, male-to-male transmission has largely been ignored by the authorities. A government minister tells the programme that homosexuality does not exist in Zambia. Colonial-era laws which make homosexual acts a crime remain on the statute books, supported by public condemnation of homosexuality as sinful and 鈥渦nAfrican鈥�. Donor countries that seek to tie aid to gay rights are condemned as imperialists. Zambia was declared a 鈥楥hristian nation鈥� 25 years ago; since then American-inspired evangelists have become very powerful. Jo considers the competing claims that both homosexuality and homophobia are Western imports.

(Photo: A barbershop in Zambia. Credit: Kieron Humphrey)