Uganda: A brand-new hardline anti-LGBTQ+ bill is not signed by the president of Uganda
By Ahmad Hadizat Omayoza, MAMOS Nigeria
Yoweri Museveni, the president of Uganda, has requested that the controversial anti-LGBTQ+ bill imposing the death penalty for homosexuality be returned to parliament for reconsideration but has refused to sign it into law.
Following a meeting between the president and MPs from the ruling party, the decision was made on Thursday to return the hardline bill to the national assembly “with proposals for its improvement.”
Although a spokesperson stated that the president had requested lawmakers to consider “the issue of rehabilitation,” it was not immediately clear whether the proposed changes would make the proposed law even more stringent. According to a statement, Museveni stated, “I completely agree with the bill, but my original problem is the psychologically disoriented person.”
Museveni has 30 days to veto the legislation and notify the parliamentary speaker, return it to parliament for revisions, or sign it into law. It might, be that as it may, pass into regulation without the president’s consent on the off chance that he returns it to parliament two times.
The bill in its ongoing structure forces capital and life-detainment sentences for gay sex, as long as 14 years for “endeavored” homosexuality, and 20 years in prison for “enrollment, advancement and subsidizing” of same-sex “exercises”.
A previous version of the bill was widely criticized on a global scale and was later overturned by Uganda’s constitutional court for procedural reasons. Homosexual sex is already punishable by life in prison in Uganda, a country in eastern Africa that is largely Christian and conservative.
On March 21, 389 MPs approved the bill almost unanimously, describing it as “shocking and discriminatory” by UN human rights chief Volker Türk.
Human rights advocates called for the bill to be completely put on hold when it was decided to return it to parliament.
“This is the respite the LGBTIQ people group required,” Clare Byarugaba, a LGBTQ+ advocate in Kampala, said in a tweet.
“Hold your freedom dear if you have never had an abhorrent state-sanctioned hate bill that hangs over your head every morning and is a matter of life or death. She wrote, “The struggle continues.”
Adrian Jjuuko, a member of the Human Rights Awareness and Promotion Forum in Kampala, stated that Museveni’s decision provided yet another opportunity to defeat the bill, despite the fact that the president’s ambiguous remarks remained troubling.
He only seems to want to spare people who come out as gay and want to get better from being punished. As the one who reports first and plays victim in a consensual relationship would get away with it, this would turn some LGBTI people against others. Second, Jjuuko stated, “The president appears to have no issue with the ambiguous language regarding promotion, which effectively renders any discussions regarding LGBTIQ as homosexuality promotion.”
