Aberdeen University moves to strip Sultan of Brunei of honorary degree
An honorary degree awarded by the University of Aberdeen to the Sultan of Brunei is now being recommended for revocation after his country made gay sex an offence punishable by stoning to death.
The strict Islamic laws that came into force on Wednesday also cover a range of other crimes including punishment for theft by amputation.
The university initially said Hassanal Bolkiah’s 1995 honour was under review. It has now said it has been recommended the award be revoked.
A University of Aberdeen spokesman said: “The honorary degrees committee has agreed that these strict anti-lgbt laws are totally counter to the university’s founding principles and values of being ‘inclusive and open to all’ and have recommended that the award be revoked.
“Their recommendation now passes to our academic body [Senate] to consider, which we anticipate to happen next week.”
Homosexuality was already illegal in Brunei and punishable by up to ten years in prison.
University of Aberdeen rector Maggie Chapman, co-convenor of the Scottish Greens, announced the review on Wednesday, saying: “We really, really have to take a stand on this, and stand in solidarity.”
Brunei, a nation state on the island of Borneo, is ruled by Sultan Hassanal and has grown rich on oil and gas exports.
Meanwhile, a global travel company has stopped selling flights on Brunei’s national carrier. STA Travel, which has 53 stores in the UK, announced that it will not sell bookings for Royal Brunei Airlines flights.
It is also offering refunds to customers who previously bought flights with the airline but do not want to use them. Royal Brunei Airlines operates the only non-stop flights between the UK and the small south-east Asian nation, with daily services between London Heathrow and Brunei International Airport.
A spokeswoman for STA Travel said: “We’re proud of our open and diverse culture and we expect our partners to demonstrate the same.”
Doing business with oil-rich despotisms carries significant reputational risks – a lesson which Western governments remain exceptionally anxious to ignore for fear of the implications.
The latest example of this simple truth involves the Sultan of Brunei who, in his advancing years, has introduced full Sharia law including the prospect of gay people being stoned to death.
Until a few years ago, the Sultan and his brother almost managed the impossible feat of jeopardising Brunei’s fabulous wealth through their incredibly vulgar spending habits. Eventually, the brother had to be ditched.
Vanity Fair magazine, which chronicled these excesses, noted that “when they partied, they indulged in just about everything forbidden in a Muslim country” while “combing the globe for the sexiest women they could find”.
Governments have to set a high bar when deciding who to deal with on ethical grounds – or else we would cut ourselves off from half
the world. Even then, I would have thought a diplomatic blackball on the Sultan of Brunei should not be too much to expect.
What struck me in my own days of dealing with some of these regimes was their arrogance. They proceeded on the assumption of untouchability. No matter what rules they broke, their Western clients would always need their money (particularly for arms dealing) more than they needed anyone’s approval. That dog/lamp-post relationship is long overdue for revisiting. While all this is tricky for governments, one does wonder on what basis the Sultan of Brunei was ever made an Honorary Doctor of Aberdeen University. As with many of these absurd honorary degrees, the risk factor is overlooked in greedy pursuit of wealth.
It is not only governments which need to square their consciences with their intellects about whose money they take.