Hello Africa!

From the cradle of apartheid, here’s something breathtaking: South Africa parliament passes a bill approving same-sex marriage.

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(from CNN.com)

South Africa bill approves same-sex marriage

CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) -- Gays in South Africa can be joined in matrimony under new legislation passed by parliament—an unprecedented move on a continent where homosexuality is taboo.

Traditionalists said they were saddened, and gay activists said the bill, passed Tuesday, did not go far enough. Veterans of the governing African National Congress hailed the Civil Union Bill for extending basic freedoms to everyone under the spirit of the country's first post-apartheid constitution, adopted a decade ago by framers determined to make discrimination a thing of the past.

“When we attained our democracy, we sought to distinguish ourselves from an unjust painful past, by declaring that never again shall it be that any South African will be discriminated against on the basis of color, creed, culture and sex,” Home Affairs Minister Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula declared.

South Africa's constitution was the first in the world to prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. That provided a powerful legal tool to gay rights activists, even though South Africa remains conservative on such issues. A traditionalist lawmaker, Kenneth Meshoe, said Tuesday was the “saddest day in our 12 years of democracy” and warned that South Africa “was provoking God's anger.”

Homosexuality is illegal in Zimbabwe, Kenya, Uganda, Nigeria, Tanzania, Ghana and most other sub-Saharan countries. Even in South Africa, gays and lesbians are often attacked because of their sexual orientation.