The Trump administration could soon eliminate former President Barrack Obama’s policy promoting gay rights in Africa, a White House official has hinted.
Director of the Office of Management and Budget, Mick Mulvaney on July 24 said that the Obama government’s advocacy amounted to the mistreatment of the African people as a response to their religious beliefs or affiliations.
“Our US taxpayer dollars are used to discourage Christian values in other democratic countries,” the White House budget chief told a religious freedom conference.
Mulvaney’s sentiments are shared by most African leaders who continue to illegalize homosexuality.
For instance, President Uhuru Kenyatta has in the past insisted that gay rights remain a “non-issue” in Kenya.
Speaking to Christiane Amanpour in April, the head of state said gay rights are not of importance to the Kenyan people because they go against the cultural beliefs of majority of the people.
“I won’t engage in a subject that is of no importance to the people of Kenya. This is not an issue of human rights, this is an issue of our own base as a culture, as a people regardless of which community you come from,” Uhuru told CNN.
The White House official maintained that the policies imposed on the African people under the previous stunned him promising that the US government under Donald Trump’s leadership will do things differently.
Read: AfDB Extends Sh30 Billion Support Towards Kenya Power’s Last Mile Connectivity Project
“It was stunning to me that my government under a previous administration would go to folks in sub-Saharan Africa and say, ‘We know that you have a law against abortion, but if you enforce that law, you’re not going to get any of our money. We know you have a law against gay marriage, but if you enforce that law, we’re not going to give you any money,” he added.
In 2015 Obama called the Supreme Court decision requiring states to recognize same-sex marriage “a victory for America” something that experts say could be affected after Trump announces his Supreme Court nominee.
The LGBTQ community is worried that whoever succeeds Justice Anthony Kennedy who is considered the court’s foremost champion of gay rights could find sexual orientation discrimination lawful.
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