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Last Updated: Feb 13, 2017 - 1:45:37 AM |
Pictured at the Ministry of Transport and Aviation at the left of the table, are from left: Attorney General Senator the Hon. Allyson Maynard Gibson; Minister of State in the Ministry of Transport and Aviation the Hon. Hope Strachan; Minister of Social Services the Hon. Melanie Griffin; Minister of Transport and Aviation the Hon. Glenys Hanna-Martin; Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Immigration Parliamentary Secretary Cleola Hamilton, M.P.; and Senator the Hon. Cheryl Bazard. (BIS Photo/Kristaan Ingraham)
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Restoring Constitutional Referendum Focus
Nassau, Bahamas - The Commonwealth Women Parliamentarians Bahamas Branch held a press briefing August 14 to announce plans to launch a campaign to bring clarity to the issues of the Constitutional Referendum currently being debated. The group attempts to re-focus on the important fundamentals of the referendum that purportedly are being clouded by extraneous matters.
The group also aims to direct discussion towards women being viewed equally under the Constitution.
Attorney General Senator the Hon. Allyson Maynard Gibson
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The following are remarks made by Attorney General, Senator Allysons Maynard Gibson:
“I
make it very clear from a legal standpoint that the use of the word
“sex” does not in my view as the Attorney General open the door for same
sex marriage. I say that if for no other reason that the very
constitution itself saves the Matrimonial Causes Act and the Matrimonial
Causes Act says that in The Bahamas a marriage is a union between a man
and a woman.
I also want to add interestingly that the word “sex” has
been in The Bahamas Constitution since 1964. It has always been known to
mean a man or a woman.”
Referring to past Privy Council rulings, the Attorney General continued
that “further, the Privy Council cases make it very clear that even
where someone has had a sex change for the purposes of marriage, your
sex is your biological or your chromosomal composition at birth, that is
XX for women and XY for men.”
These rulings represent important
precedents that are effective checks against marriages within the LGBT
social grouping not involving a man and a woman.
So it is clear that The Bahamas constitution, together with the statute
laws of The Bahamas and Privy Council rulings on gender effectively
render same sex marriages unconstitutional, therefore illegal.
As for
the argument that the insertion of the word “sex” opens the door for
same sex marriage, there is simply no legal foundation to support this
suggestion, fear or concern and the perpetrators of this piece of
misinformation have not provided the legal foundation on which this so
called argument is supposedly built. From all indications, the argument
is merely a false and fabricated premise, being used as a pretext to
inject the highly emotive topic of same sex marriage into the national
debate to create confusion and fear and to deflect from the salient
constitutional issues at hand which is the expansion of personal rights
and freedoms to men, women and children, thereby guaranteeing equality
for all under the law." - Attorney General Hon. Allison Maynard Gibson
© Copyright 2014 by thebahamasweekly.com
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