Prime Minister Patrick Manning of Trinidad and Tobago landed himself in political hot waters during his first media briefing as chairman of CHOGM when he described human rights as "domestic issues" that have no place on the summit agenda.Commonwealth leaders opened their biennial summit in Port of Spain Friday morning and Manning took over the group's chairmanship from Uganda.
The international gathering was supposed to be Manning's moment of glory, but he landed in the middle of a building controversy over human rights involving two African Commonwealth members - Uganda and the Gambia.
Human rights groups that have been urging Commonwealth leaders to put pressure on Uganda to drop proposed legislation that calls for the execution of HIV-infected gays and lesbians.
The private member's bill under consideration proposes the execution of gays and lesbians who have sex and makes it mandatory for all Ugandans, including family and friends, to report this sexual activity to authorities within 24 hours.
Opponents of the bill say Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, who handed over the chairmanship of CHOGM to Manning Friday, fully backs the measure.
They have also been calling for the Commonwealth to censure Gambian President Yahya Jammeh of Gambia for threatening to kill human-rights activists in his country.
Read the story: Rights groups demand action from Commonwealth on Gambia
Jammeh decided to stay away from the Port of Spain summit to avoid the controversy, but rights groups have insisted that his non-attendance must not mean the issue must come off the agenda.
But it was the Uganda homophobic bill that caused a stir at Manning's first media conference Friday afternoon.
He told reporters, "Individual countries have their own positions on these matters...but it doesn't form part of our agenda. It need not detain us."
Canadian HIV-AIDS activist Stephen Lewis was furious. He told the Ottawa Citizen newspaper Manning's comments are "a terrible error in judgment." However he said he expects other Commonwealth leaders, including Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, would pressure Uganda to drop the bill.
Lewis hopes leaders would raise the issue "in the corridors outside the meeting".
He told the Citizen the bill will demonize homosexuality, intensify the stigma suffered by all AIDS sufferers in Africa and drive gay men and women underground.
"It will diminish dramatically the prospect of counselling and testing to establish HIV status...and to make it virtually impossible to reach homosexuals with the knowledge and education and condoms that prevent the spread of AIDS."
Maja Daruwala, executive director of the New Delhi-based Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative, called Manning's attitude to the Ugandan and Gambian situation misguided.
"It's a great pity that the leader of a country with a good record on human rights would miss the opportunity to show real leadership," she said. "As the new chairman of the Commonwealth, he has failed an early test."
She added, "It is not only disappointing but against all Commonwealth principles. He is dismissing the cries of ordinary citizens who are asking their leaders for basic human rights."
Royal Commonwealth Society director Dhananjayan Sriskandarajah was also shocked at Manning's remarks.
"The Commonwealth is about shared values and principles everyone has signed on to...so if they can't be discussed here, then where? If a member state falls short you either help them or sanction them in some way.
"If the Commonwealth stops being about that, we've lost another leg of the Commonwealth stool," he said.
The Royal Commonwealth society released a comprehensive report on the eve of the CHOGM warning that unless the Commonwealth makes drastic changes to the way it operates it risks become irrelevant with its voice muted on the global stage.
Read the story: Report warns that Commonwealth risks becoming irrelevant
Homophobia is a contentious issue in the Caribbean and Jamaican Prime Minister Bruce Golding faced tough questions recently over the issue on the BBC's Hard talk program.
Watch that interview on YouTube
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