Anthony Mundine, an Australian boxing champion and former rugby player, has suggested that harsh punishment like the death penalty would deter people from homosexuality.

Speaking to the Daily Telegraph, Mundine made the controversial statements earlier this week after voluntarily leaving the Australian reality show I'm a Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here!

"If we were to live in a society, just like in Aboriginal culture, that homosexuality is forbidden and you do it and the consequences are capital punishment or death, you think you are going to do it?" he said. "Or think twice about doing it?"

The 42-year-old devout Muslim went on to say that gay people should not be allowed on television because they may influence young children. "They are not going to be happy until they have primary school kids being gay," he said. "I talk the truth. It is the system."

"I don't care if you are gay or not, it doesn't worry me because the creator will judge you later," he continued. "If you are going to be gay, do it behind closed doors, that is how it used to be in the olden days."

Discussing LGBT equality, Mundine also claimed that pedophiles will be the next group to demand equal rights. "Because they are pushing these gay rights so much in the Western world, the pedophiles out there want their rights."

Doubling down on many of his anti-gay statements on Facebook, Mundine later clarified that his "capital punishment talk" was reserved for pedophiles.

Before joining I'm a Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here!, Mundine told the Sydney Morning Herald that homosexuality is "confusing to society."