Controversial and self-proclaimed ‘homophobic’ Zimbabwean MP, Temba Mliswa has threatened to introduce draconian legislation which will stifle the media after he was seemingly outed by an online publication.
Mliswa who is the MP for Norton was furious that an online publication published his estranged lover Susan Vivian Mutami’s allegations. Mutami who claims that she is three months pregnant with the MP’s twins sensationally accused Mliswa of being a pansexual after the two fell out after their brief tempestuous affair.
The health care professional who is based in Australia claimed that Mliswa had confessed to her that he had done everything that people could think of in the bedroom including being intimate with other men, having bisexual relationships and participating in foursomes.
Perhaps, aware of the implications that such allegations carry, Mliswa responded furiously to his ex-lover’s allegations. In a bid to prove he’s not gay, Mliswa stunningly declared that he is “actually homophobic” at a press conference held at his home. However, the presser was aborted after the Zimbabwe Republic Police gatecrashed the event and arrested the MP for contravening Covid-19 allegations.
Before the police arrested him, however, Mliswa threatened to move a motion in parliament for the enactment of a harsh media law that imposes custodial sentences for unethical journalists.
Speaking at the press conference in Harare, Honourable Mliswa said he would influence the ruling Zanu PF party to use its two-thirds majority in parliament to enact the law.
Same-sex relationships are frowned upon in the country and regarded as a cultural taboo. A 2006 revision to the country’s criminal code criminalized any actions perceived as homosexual. The law made it a criminal offence for two men to hold hands, hug, or kiss or commit a acts that “would be regarded by a reasonable person as an indecent act.” The offence can carry an extended prison term.
Section 74 of the Zimbabwean criminal code reads:
‘…any male person who, with the consent of another male person, knowingly performs with that other person anal sexual intercourse, or any act involving physical contact other than anal sexual intercourse that would be regarded by a reasonable person to be an indecent act, shall be guilty of sodomy and liable to a fine up to or exceeding level fourteen or imprisonment for a period not exceeding one year or both.’
Zimbabwe’s new constitution, signed into law by former President Mugabe in May 2013, prohibits gay marriage. Article 78(3) states that ‘Persons of the same sex are prohibited from marrying each other’.
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