THE Patterson Administration yesterday said a resounding no to proposals from the local homosexual community to include sexual orientation among a new set of constitutional rights being currently considered and to abolish the buggery laws.

Information Minister Colin Campbell told journalists that while the Cabinet discussed the report of the Parliamentary Committee which reviewed the Charter of Rights Bill, the proposal concerning decriminalising homosexuality was not considered.

"It is not an issue. We will not be considering the issue of homosexuality... That issue is not on the agenda of the Cabinet," Campbell told journalists at the weekly post-Cabinet press briefing at Jamaica House.

"In relation to the joint select committee report, we considered six matters (and) homosexuality was not one of the issues," he added."

He said Cabinet considered the following areas of the committee's report:

* Who will be bound by the Charter;

* The Rights of the Child;

* Right to Trial by Jury;

* Protection of Property Rights; and

* International Human Rights Instruments.

Last June, Donna Smith, spokesperson for the Jamaica Forum of Lesbians, All Sexuals and Gays (J-FLAG) made a passionate appeal to legislators to offer constitutional protection to homosexual males. These persons, she argued, were being targeted by law enforcement personnel on the strength of Section 76 of the Offences Against the Person Act, which addresses buggery.

"Although not all gay men engage in anal intercourse... it is so much a part of the essence of the intimate interaction between gay men," Smith argued, "that a law against it is, in essence, a law against male homosexuality."

However, in preparing their report, the group of legislators expressed reluctance to include sexual orientation among the proposed rights to be protected by the Constitution because of the "implications which this would have, in particular ... in relation to the institution of marriage and questions of parenting".

The parliamentarians noted that the representatives of J-FLAG had themselves conceded that the Marriage Act would be inconsistent with making homosexuality constitutionally protected.

But legislators have been more accommodating to the possibility of the "repeal of the provisions of the Offences Against the Person Act in so far as it relates to the offence of buggery between consenting adults".

This, however, has little chance of success in Parliament, as few legislators, on either side of the political divide, would be willing to risk their political capital among the Jamaican populace, which is severely intolerant of homosexuality.

It is customary for dancehall artistes, during on-stage performances, to issue insults at homosexuals.

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