Human Rights groups are calling on the President of Gambia to reject a law to penalize “aggravated homosexuality” with a term of life imprisonment.  Despotic President Yahya Jammeh, however, is highly unlikely to be swayed by the calls of human rights organizations.

“Gambia’s national assembly and the president should not endorse state-sponsored homophobia,” said Amnesty International’s Stephen Cockburn, who described the legislation as a “profoundly damaging act that violates international human rights law.”

But President Jammeh has a history of off-the-wall homophobia, once going as far as threatening to “behead” all LGBT people in the Gambia.  Last year, Jammeh told the United Nations General Assembly, “Those who promote homosexuality want to put an end to human existence.”  So.. more than a little whacky.

The current law punishes same-sex relationships with prison terms of up to 14 years. The new bill passed by parliament on 25 August could be used to target “repeat offenders” and people living with HIV. 

Jammeh is a major league screwball who: once claimed to have invented an herbal cure for HIV; thinks the first transatlantic flight landed in Gambia; is implicated in the suppression of free speech and oppression and occasional murders of journalists.