Withdraw anti-gay law, Uganda told

Both Britain and Canada’s prime ministers have told President Yoweri Museveni that a proposed law that would result in homosexuals in Uganda being imprisoned for life or even executed needs to be withdrawn.

The proposed legislation has created a furore in Western countries with protesters saying it contravenes international human rights legislation.

Both British leader Gordon Brown and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper are understood to have told President Museveni that the legislation was unacceptable when they met with Uganda’s leader over a private breakfast meeting at the Commonwealth Heads of Government summit that finished on Monday (November 30).

Although homosexuality remains a crime in many Commonwealth countries, few have proposed as draconian new legislation as that currently being debated in Kampala.

The Anti-Homosexuality Bill 2009 is going through Uganda’s Parliament after receiving its first reading last month.

According to Clause 2 of the Bill, a person who is convicted of gay sex is liable to life imprisonment.

But if that person is also HIV positive the penalty — under the heading “aggravated homosexuality” — is death.

The Bill is not an official piece of legislation from the Ugandan government but it has allowed it to proceed, and some top officials are said to have supported it.

“If adopted, a Bill further criminalising homosexuality would constitute a significant step backwards for the protection of human rights in Uganda,” a Canadian government spokesperson said.

The Bill proposes a three-year prison sentence for anyone who is aware of evidence of homosexuality and fails to report it to the police within 24 hours.

It would also impose a sentence of up to seven years for anyone who defends the rights of homosexuals.

Mockery of principles

Addressing the Commonwealth People’s Forum, Stephen Lewis, the former UN envoy on Aids in Africa, said that the Bill made a mockery of Commonwealth principles.

“Nothing is as stark, punitive and redolent of hate as the Bill in Uganda.”

In the UK, so strong is the level of protest that there have been calls either for British aid to Kampala to be halted or for Uganda to be suspended from the Commonwealth until the legislation is withdrawn.