By Isaac Salima:
Hearing of the same sex relations case continued yesterday with the State cross-examining one of the claimants, Win Akstar.
Akstar and transgender individual Jana Gonani want the court to decriminalise laws that punish people who indulge in same sex activities.
The State, led by Attorney General (AG) Thabo Chakaka Nyirenda, quizzed Akstar on a number of issues regarding his stand on the matter.
For about three-and-a-half hours, the AG tussled with Akstar on his fight to have the Constitutional Court declare unconstitutional Penal Code provisions that criminalise same sex activities.
Chakaka Nyirenda asked Akstar if he is gay or not and the appellant said he is not.
“Then why are you fighting for the rights of others and, yet, you are not one of them?” Nyirenda queried.
Akstar, a Dutch national who is single, said he is only fighting for people’s rights in the country.
He denied allegations that he had carnal knowledge of some nine people who went on to lodge a complaint to police.
At some point, Akstar went emotional and refused to answer some questions from the AG, claiming that he was being forced to address questions he already answered.
Akstar, a former financial director at Timotheous Foundation, was arrested in 2021 after some employees and students at the institution complained that he had been sexually abusing them by, among other things, forcing them to suck his penis and indulge in anal sex.
In another cross-examination with State lawyer Victor Jere later in the afternoon, Akstar claimed that he was arrested because of his gay behaviour not because he was one of them.
Nyirenda said he was happy that cross examination went well.
“We demonstrated that there was non-consensual sex between the accused and the complainants. Mr Akstar has also said that he is not gay and this is crucial in court because you cannot come to court without sufficient interest in the case. So, he cannot also complain on behalf of others. As such, that is what we argued during the hearing,” Chakaka Nyirenda said.
The case has been adjourned to today.
