Ugandan President Signs New Anti-LGBTQ Law

Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni has finally signed into law the country’s anti-gay bill, according to a release from his office and the country’s parliament.

The president’s official Twitter account commenting on it said Museveni “has assented to the Anti-Homosexuality Bill 2023. It now becomes the Anti-Homosexuality Act 2023,”

Uganda’s parliament said Museveni had approved a new draft of the legislation passed overwhelmingly this month by lawmakers, who defended the measures as a protection of national culture and values.

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In typical fashion, international countries and organizations have described the law as some of the world’s harshest draconian measures against homosexuality.

Meanwhile, the president had called on MPs to rework the bill, although most of the hardline provisions that caused an outcry in the West and warnings of diplomatic repercussions were retained.

The amended version said that identifying as gay would not be criminalized but “engaging in acts of homosexuality” would be punishable with life imprisonment.

Although Museveni had advised lawmakers to delete a provision making “aggravated homosexuality” a capital offence, lawmakers rejected that move, meaning that repeat offenders could be sentenced to death.

LGBTQ+ rights campaigners say the new legislation is unnecessary in a country where homosexuality has long been illegal under a colonial-era law criminalizing sexual activity “against the order of nature.” The punishment for that offence is life imprisonment.

The United States had warned of economic consequences over legislation described by Amnesty International as “draconian and overly broad.” In a statement from the White House later Monday, U.S. President Joe Biden called the new law “a tragic violation of universal human rights — one that is not worthy of the Ugandan people, and one that jeopardizes the prospects of critical economic growth for the entire country.”

In a joint statement, the leaders of the U.N. AIDS program, the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief and the Global Fund said they were “deeply concerned about the harmful impact” of the legislation on public health and the HIV response.

They believe that this somehow will put Uganda’s progress on its HIV response in grave jeopardy.”