Fiji LGBT Laws

The 1997 [R1.1] the constitution of Fiji was amended banning discrimination based on sexual orientation [R1.2].

Section 37(2)(a) “A person must not be unfairly discriminated against,directly or indirectly, on the grounds of his or her: (a) actual or suposed personal characteristics or circumstances, including race, ethnic origin, colour, place of origin, gender, sexual orientation, birth, primary language, economic status, age or disability; or (b) opinions or beliefs, except to the extent that those opinions or beliefs involve harm to others or the diminution of the rights or freedoms of others; or on any other ground prohibited by this constitution.” [R1.3].

Section 37(3) says: “Accordingly, neither a law nor an administrative action taken under a law may directly or indirectly impose a disability or restriction on any person on a prohibited ground.” [R1.3].

On 11 November 2015, it was reported that the Suva High Court dismissed the application of an unnamed 42-year-old transgender woman seeking an order that her Fijian birth certificate be corrected to state that she is now female after transitioning surgically and to have her gender as a woman legally recognized in Fiji [R1.1].

On 10 April 2017, it was reported that the health ministry in Fiji confirmed homosexuals are banned from donating blood because they are seen as high-risk donors [R1.1].

In March 2010, a new decree confirmed that sex between consenting people of the same gender is now legal [R1.1].

Previously:

In July 2006, the Fijian High Commission confirmed that gay men will no longer be arrested for consensual sex in the privacy of their own home [R1.2]

Quaere in 2005, consensual sex between same-sex couples was decriminalised [R1.3].

Article 175 of Fiji’s Penal Code provided for up to 14 years’ imprisonment, with or without corporal punishment, for any person who had carnal knowledge of any person against the order of nature [R1.3], [R1.4].

Article 177 provided for up to five years imprisonment for any male person who, whether in public or private, committed any act of gross indecency with another male person [R1.4].

In October 1998, the Committee on Consequental Legislation of Parliament decided to amend the Bill of Rights to explicitly read that homosexual relationships and same-sex marriages remain illegal [R1.5].

In March 2006, two men were charged with sodomy in Fiji despite a high court ruling that the law is unconstitutional [R2.1].

In September 2005, Lautoka High Court judge Justice Gerard Winter found that convictions imposed on two men for having consensual, private, adult homosexual sex were invalid because they were inconsistent with the 1997 Constitution’s protection of privacy and equality. But his judgment only applied to homosexual acts in private [R2.2].

On 10 April 2019, the Director of the Human Rights and Anti-Discrimination Commission Ashwin Raj reportedly expressed the view that international human rights law does not necessarily recognise same sex marriage as a right, based on the (quaere: 24 June 2010) European Court of Human Rights finding (quaere: in the case of Case of Schalk and Kopf v. Austria) that the European Convention of Human Rights does not include the right to marriage for same sex couples and equality on the grounds of sex and gender may be delivered as long as the marital status does not carry with it legal rights which are not available to unmarried couples [R1.2].

In October 1998, the Committee on Consequental Legislation of Parliament decided to amend the Bill of Rights to explicitly read that homosexual relationships and same-sex marriages remain illegal [R1.1].