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Date: Mon, 1 Nov 1999 21:51:42 -0600 (CST)
From: Grassroots Media Network <gnn@grassrootsnews.org>
Subject: ROUNDUPS OF GAYS REPORTEDLY HAVE BEGUN IN UGANDA
Article: 80925
To: undisclosed-recipients:;
Message-ID: <bulk.13890.19991103091527@chumbly.math.missouri.edu>
Roundups of gays reportedly have begun in Uganda
Intolerant rhetoric turns to repressive reality
The Queer News Network, press release 1 November 1999
Contacts:
Jaime Balboa, Director of Public Education
Phone: 415-255-8680; E-mail: jaime@iglhrc.org
Kamal Fizazi, Regional Program Coordinator: Africa and Southwest Asia
Phone: 212-216-1256; E-mail: kamal@iglhrc.org
UGANDA Arrests of gay men have begun in Uganda, following a recent
statement by President Yoweri Museveni that he would order police to
"lock up" homosexuals, reports the San Francisco based International
Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC). In the wake of
Museveni's statement, IGLHRC's Kamal Fizazi, Regional Program
Coordinator for Africa and Southwest Asia, visited Uganda and met
with gay men. "Some men have gone into hiding in fear of arrest,"
Fizazi said.
Museveni was recently quoted in the state-owned newspaper New Vision
as saying: "I have told the CID [Criminal Investigations Department]
to look for homosexuals, lock them up, and charge them." The
statement followed press reports, apparently false, of a marriage
ceremony between two gay men in a suburb of Kampala.
According to Fizazi, "Authoritarian leaders like Museveni demonize
homosexuality hoping to shore up their political support. This
intolerance will spread until it is recognized for what it is--a
threat to democracy and fundamental human rights."
IGLHRC has received reliable reports that one individual is being
held in Luzeira Prison outside the capital, Kampala. Other reports
indicate that at least five others may also now be jailed under
Uganda's laws banning sex "against the order of nature." Fizazi is
maintaining contact with Ugandan activists and urges those who are
concerned to wait before taking actions which, though well
intentioned, might have the inadvertent effect of exacerbating
matters.
"Any arrest based on sexual orientation is in flagrant disregard of
international human rights precedent," said Jaime Balboa, IGLHRC's
Director of Public Education. "By mobilizing its police to arrest
gay people, Uganda is locating itself well outside the norms of the
international human rights community," he continued.
"Ugandan law punishes same-sex love with life imprisonment," said
Fizazi. "Under this harsh law, even individuals who elude
imprisonment face constant fear, stigmatization, and the threat of
extortion by the police," he continued.
IGLHRC's mission is to protect and advance the human rights of all
people and communities subject to discrimination or abuse on the
basis of sexual orientation, gender identity or HIV status.
END PRESS RELEASE
UGANDA: BACKGROUND INFORMATION
Recent years have seen a wave of intolerant public statements on
homosexuality by African political leaders. 1n 1995, President
Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe banned gay and lesbian participants from an
international book fair; he has reiterated his opposition to
homosexuality on numerous subsequent occasions, calling gays and
lesbians "people without rights" and "worse than dogs and pigs."
Politicians in Botswana, Namibia, and Zambia have adopted similar
public stances. Following Museveni's statement, Kenyan President
Daniel Arap Moi also declared that he would combat the "scourge" of
homosexuality.
Museveni's recent statement is not his first foray into
officially-sponsored homophobia. In July 1998, he told reporters,
"When I was in America some time ago, I saw a rally of 300,000
homosexuals. If you have a rally of 30 homosexuals here, I would
disperse it."
The heavy-handed repression of homosexual behavior has already roused
debate within Uganda. After witnessing a 1998 news report on the
arrest of a gay man, who was stripped by the police before the
cameras to prove he was a man, a commentator in the opposition
newspaper The Monitor wrote that Ugandan law should "protect every
single person from inhuman and degrading treatment." Such treatment,
the commentator declared, "was exactly what the police were doing."
The person arrested in that case has been detained again in the wake
of Musaveni's latest statement.
Responding to Museveni's and Arap Moi's recent statements, the
Monitor declared on October 4 that "The presidents' attacks on
homosexuals are not based on any sound evidence."
Homosexuals, a columnist in the paper wrote, "should enjoy the same
rights and freedoms as their heterosexual counterparts, including the
freedom from harassment by the state and individuals."
However, despite such opposition, the machinery for denying those
rights remains in place in Uganda. In addition to the law on acts
"against the order of nature," other laws on loitering, "causing a
breach of public peace," or being "idle and disorderly" are used to
crack down on any public evidence of homosexuality or transgender
identity in Uganda.
Paragraph 140 of the Ugandan Penal Code stipulates that "Any person
who has carnal knowledge of any person against the order of nature"
is subject to life imprisonment. The law dates back to the penal
provisions imposed during the era of British colonialism and was
strengthened in 1990 to increase the penalty from 14 years to life.
All these laws can be used against both men and women. It is unclear
which laws will be used to charge those arrested.
Nor is this arsenal of legal means of repression unique to Uganda.
"Worldwide," IGLHRC's Fizazi explained, "both specific laws against
sexual acts and vague laws regarding idleness or 'public scandal'
serve to repress manifestations of sexual difference."
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