BELMOPAN, Belize (CMC) — The Belize Government says there will be no gender policy as a result of a recent ruling by the Supreme Court that overturned the country’s sodomy law, ruling that Section 53 of the Criminal Code which criminalises consenting intercourse between adults of the same sex contravenes the right granted by the constitution.

“No gender policy will emerge in consequence of the chief justice’s ruling and do or set out some of the things that the churches seem to fear are inevitable consequences. It won’t happen. Nothing will change except, as I said, in this narrow regard,” said Prime Minister Dean Barrow.

“I can, in good conscience, say to the nation that insofar as the claimants are concerned, they have been given what is, without a doubt, a shield — they have not been given a sword, and the entire nation must understand this,” Barrow told reporters.

Earlier this month, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender activist Caleb Orozco and his United Belize Advocacy Movement expressed satisfaction with the ruling by Chief Justice Kenneth Benjamin that Section 53 of the Criminal Code which criminalises consenting intercourse between adults of the same sex contravenes the right granted by the Belize Constitution.

Orozco and the group had, in 2010, challenged the law, claiming it contravened the country’s constitution of no interference with a person’s dignity and personal privacy, as well as equality and equal treatment of all persons before the law.

In a letter written by the Roman Catholic Church to Barrow earlier this week, Bishops Dorick Wright and Christopher Glancy highlighted the urgent need for appeal of the ruling, noting that in other countries decriminalisation of certain aspects of the sodomy law had been successfully challenged.

The church maintains that legalisation gave sudden rise to gay marriage legislation, laws which seriously breach the right of a child to a mother and a father. The church further contends that decriminalization can allow for the establishment of “a draconian gender agenda in the school system”.

But, said Barrow, “we will, I repeat, make the rounds to set out Government’s position clearly to try to educate people.

“We will continue to appeal for calm and respect to the ruling and for the differences among us. We will not just do the media rounds, if there are pamphlets and bulletins and literature that we have to put out, we will do so.

“Cabinet has directed that we meet with the churches so that what I am saying here might be repeated and have the benefit of their forensic questioning of Government in order to try as much as possible to clarify this absolutely horribly complicated issue,” he told reporters.

Barrow made it clear that his Administration would not be appealing the decision of the Supreme Court.

“The chief justice found that that section, except by reading it down, is against the constitution of the country, which is the supreme law; that is the role of the chief justice, that is the function of the judiciary in our society.”

Barrow said that he had been approached by a pastor telling him that the chief justice amended the constitution.

“He did no such thing. He amended Section 53 and he interpreted the constitution with respect to one provision in a certain way, but again, as the attorney general has said, that is the role of the judiciary. That is the function of the courts in our constitutional democracy.

“So disagree with it all you like, and that is also your right in a democracy, but please do not say it is what it is not and please do not say that it is the Government. We fought the case [and] we have to pay costs you know, that is what I would want to appeal.

Meanwhile, the main opposition Belize Progressive Party (BPP) is calling on the Government to make the ruling an issue for a referendum here.

” … Referendums are used to guide elected members in Government, what the will of the people they are governing is,” BPP leader Patrick Rogers said.

“Now, any responsible Administration, after seeing the results of a referendum, if they choose to maintain a stance that is in opposing view to that referendum result, they won’t be governing much longer, I assure you. Because laws must benefit the population — our constitution says to make laws that are beneficial to the people of Belize, right? So if the law is not beneficial to us, we have a right to resist that law. If we say we want the law to be this way and the Government refuses to put the law this way, they won’t be governing too long.”