The South African Imam who dedicated his life to promoting Gay rights, and tolerance to LGBTQ Muslims was shot and killed on Saturday in the coastal city of Gqeberh, police said.
Muhsin Hendricks drank some as the first open gay imam in the world. In 2018, he founded the al-Ghurbah Foundation, a non-profit organization that Provided support services because Muslims discriminated against because of their sexual orientation.
The organization has worked to help Muslims around the world to reconcile their faith with their sexual orientation and gender identity.
Statement of Human Rights of South Africa condemned the murder. He quoted footage on social networks where a hooded man came out of the truck and fired shots through the car windows in the living space before accelerating. The video was not confirmed by the New York Times.
The Deputy Minister of Justice of South Africa, Andries Nel, said it was too early to say whether shooting was a hate crime, but said the police were “hot for the fifth suspects.”
Mr. Hendricks faced a fierce criticism in the country, especially on social media.
In an interview on Monday with Newzro Africa, South African digital channelMr. Nel said that, although there are discussions among Muslims on the rights of homosexuals in South Africa, these discussions recognize the primacy of the constitutional protection of the country.
“They were unambiguous in confirming the value of our Constitution, the values of the tolerance of plurality and human respect,” he said.
Mr. Hendricks was a prominent supporter of gay people in South Africa, which in 1998 became the first country in Africa to decriminalize homosexuality, when the High Court in Johannesburg ruled that the existing existing Sodomia’s laws are violated Constitution after Apartheid.
Research 2021 Rated South Africa As the second strongest tolerant country on the continent when it comes to same -sex relations, after the island state of Cabo Verde.
International lesbian, gay, bisexual, the association’s transgender said it was “deeply shocked” by killing. Mr. Hendricks had mentored people In South Africa and around the world as they tried to reconcile their faith and life and were “a testimony of healing that solidarity in communities can bring,” Julia Ehrt, executive director of the group, said in a statement.
South Africa on the continent is seen as extraordinary to access the rights of homosexuals. More than 30 of the 54 countries of Africa criminalized same -sex couplesAnd in recent years, at least six countries, including Ghana and Uganda, have taken steps under sharper laws against Gay.
