South Africa

In December 2005, the Constitutional Court of South Africa ruled that denying marriage to same-sex couples violates the country's constitution and gave the Parliament one year to adjust laws to comply with the ruling. The court also made it clear enacting only a civil unions law would not work. On November 14, 2006, Parliament voted, 230 to 41, to end the exclusion of same-sex couples from marriage in South Africa, making the nation the first in Africa to do so.