Activists praise Mexico’s proposal on gay marriage

World Today

In this March 11, 2010 file photo, same sex couples celebrate after getting married at City Hall in Mexico City. The couples wed under Latin America’s first law that explicitly approves gay marriage. Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto on Tuesday, May 17, 2016, proposed legalizing gay marriage, a move that would enshrine on a national level a Supreme Court ruling last year that it was unconstitutional for states to bar same-sex couples from wedding. (AP Photo/Eduardo Verdugo, File)

President Enrique Pena Nieto’s proposal to legalise same-sex marriage in Mexico was an “unexpected” announcement that “enshrines” the process to achieve this right, said gay rights activist Alejandro Brito.

The director of Letra S, a human rights group specializing in sexual diversity issues, praised Pena Nieto’s initiative, which was announced Tuesday at an event to mark the International Day Against Homophobia.

The proposal is based on a Supreme Court ruling last year that it was unconstitutional for states to bar same-sex couples from wedding.

But the decision did not specifically overturn state laws, meaning that couples have had to sue in court in each particular case.

That’s why Alejandro Brito thinks the president’s initiative will put an end to “the reluctance of many governors and local lawmakers to reform their local laws to recognize this right.”

Gay marriage is already legal in some parts of Mexico such as the capital, the northern state of Coahuila and Quintana Roo state on the Caribbean coast.

Adding it to the constitution and the civil code would expand gay marriage rights across the country.