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| Uganda 2011 Gay Pride |
Last year, despite the climate of fervent anti-gay hostility, Ugandan volunteer LGBT activists accomplished what seemed impossible – they launched the first every Gay Pride celebration in Uganda. Cloaked in secrecy, the Pride preparations began some months in advance, with a core few leading a determined community toward that successful day, which became known as Beach Pride Uganda. Almost a year has passed since, and the community is determined to hold its second such annual event.
Until the U.S. Evangelicals, Lou Engle and Scott Lively went into Uganda preaching anti-gay hate back in 2008, Ugandans tolerated homosexuality, without giving it much attention and Uganda was not on the international LGBT map. Most of Africa had seemed not to care about gay relationships, notwithstanding that the British colonialists had left their mark, with penal codes that criminalized what was termed “acts against the order of nature,” which intended to criminalize the act of sodomy, and began to be interpreted as criminalizing homosexual relationships.
The aftermath of crazed workshops led by the Christian religious extremists Engle and Lively, as well as their meetings with and support of Ugandan politicians, led to the introduction of the Anti-Homosexuality Bill in Uganda, which, despite numerous introductions into parliament, and enormous popularity, has yet to be made law. The Bill if passed, could impose the death penalty for so called “aggravated homosexuality,” life in prison for gays, lesbian bisexual and transgender people, as well as lengthy prison terms for families, friends, landlords, teachers, doctors and anyone in the community who fail to report “known homosexuals.” The new legislation would also make the so-called, (though impossible to define) act of “promoting” homosexuality, illegal.
The Ugandan LGBT community is acutely aware that the government authorities, albeit unconstitutional, and despite a current lawsuit against Minister Lokodo, will do everything in their power to undermine Pride, with probable raids and arrests, just like last year. So again, as organizing continues, and despite the fact that there is nothing illegal under current law to prevent Pride, much must be done in privacy and secret.
Source: O-blog-dee-o-blog-daa, Melanie Nathan, June 4, 2013
