Deputy Attorney General Andries Nel said South Africa’s police were the police who killed the suspect behind Muhsin Hendricks, known as the world’s first public Gay imam.
The 57-year-old was in a car when he was shot dead in the coastal city of Gqeberha on Saturday.
CCTV footage of the incident showed a leading man exhausting a pickup truck that stopped Hendrix’s vehicle and then shot through the window.
Imam, known for his work to create safe havens for gay and other marginalized Muslims, shocked the LGBTQ+ community and beyond.
An investigation is underway, but Nell told Newzroom Afrika TV channel that it is too early to say whether it is a hate crime.
Nell said no further details were provided, and Deputy Police Secretary Polly Boshielo told him that police were tracking down the alleged killer.
Nell pays tribute to Hendricks, who says he is a South African who we all are proud of and that we can all aspire to be.”
Hendricks’ work challenges traditional interpretations of Islam against same-sex relations.
While it is clear that it is in condemns the killings with the South African Muslim Judicial Commission (MJC) Hendricks, one of the country’s major religious groups.
It said: “As a member of a democratic, diverse society, the MJC still firmly advocates for peaceful coexistence and mutual respect, even in different perspectives.”
Another leading Muslim body, the United Ulama Council of South Afriva, has the theme of “extrajudicial killing” and urges people not to draw conclusions about motivations.
South Africa’s constitution was adopted after the end of the white minority rule in 1994, the first constitution in the world to protect people from discrimination from sexual orientation, and became the first country in Africa to legalize same-sex marriage in 2006.
But despite the thriving LGBTQ+ community, homosexuals still face discrimination and violence. The country is also one of the highest murder rates in the world.
Hendricks appeared as a gay person in 1996, shocking the wider Muslim community in his hometown of Cape Town and elsewhere.
That same year he founded the inner circle, a space for support and security for queer Muslims, trying to reconcile their beliefs and sexual behavior before inclusive fake ghurbaah mosques can be established.
He is the subject of the 2022 documentary called “A Activist” and says to the threat he faces: “There is a need for real needs to be greater than the fear of dying.”
Hendricks often talks about the importance of interfaith dialogue and the need to address the mental health problems and trauma faced by LGBTQ+ individuals within religious groups.
He was at the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Bisexual Association World Conference held in Cape Town last year: “It’s important that we stop seeing religion as our enemy.”
Other reports from Todah Opeyemi.
