The United Nations and the NGO Amnesty International on Wednesday called on Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni to reject the anti-LGBTQ+ law.
On Tuesday 21 March, Ugandan MPs passed a law to further criminalise homosexuality. According to the text, the content of which has not yet been made public, any person recognised as homosexual or claiming to be part of the LGBTQ+ community is liable to imprisonment for up to 10 years or even the death penalty.
However, this law does not require the approval of all. Indeed, the day after the legislation was passed by parliament, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, called on President Yoweri Museveni not to promulgate the text. “The vote on this discriminatory text – probably the worst of its kind in the world – is a deeply disturbing development,” he said in a statement released on Wednesday.
According to the human rights leader, “If enacted by the President, (this law) will make lesbians, gays and bisexuals criminals in Uganda by the mere fact of their existence (…). It could give a free hand to the systematic violation of almost all their human rights,” he added.
Tigere Chagutah, Regional Director for Eastern and Southern Africa at Amnesty International, said the law was a “serious assault on the LGBTI community”. That is why “President Yoweri Museveni must urgently veto this appalling bill, which was passed in a hasty vote on the evening of 21 March,” he said.
Tigere Chagutah also added that “This ambiguous and vaguely worded law criminalises even those who ‘promote’ homosexuality” and that it “will institutionalise discrimination, hatred and prejudice against LGBTI people”.
Uganda has strict legislation against homosexuality. Uganda has strict legislation against homosexuality. While the president himself called them ‘deviant’.
