By Muheebwa Hillary
The president of Uganda, Yoweri Kaguta Museveni, has today Monday assented to the anti-homosexuality bill, signing it into law.
The bill is popular with the conservative local constituency that is vehemently opposed to homosexuality, but international rights groups have condemned it as draconian.
The law punishes first-time offenders with 14 years in jail. It also sets life imprisonment as the penalty for acts of “aggravated homosexuality”. This category of offenses is defined as repeated gay sex between consenting adults and acts involving minors, a disabled person, or where one partner is infected with HIV. The new law also makes it a crime not to report gay people.
The bill had been passed by parliament in December last year.
Local and international media were present at state house Entebbe, as the president signed the new law. Earlier on, Ugandan Government spokesman Ofwono Opondo said, the president “wants to sign it with the full witness of the international media to demonstrate Uganda’s independence in the face of Western pressure and provocation.”
“Homosexuals are nurtured but not natured. No study has shown that one can be a homosexual purely by nature. Since nurture is the cause, that is why I have agreed to sign the Bill into law,” Museveni said during the public signing of the Bill into law at State House Entebbe.
US President Barack Obama had urged Museveni not to sign the bill, saying doing so would “complicate” the east African country’s relationship with Washington. Uganda receives a reported $400m (£240m) in annual aid from the US.
In South Africa, former archbishop Desmond Tutu said he was disheartened by President Museveni’s apparent change of stance.
According to Amnesty International, homosexuality is illegal in 38 out of 54 African countries, where most sodomy laws were introduced during colonial period.
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