Life imprisonment for love
Life imprisonment for homosexuality: on this day, Uganda's president signed a law with devastating consequences.
On 24 February 2014, Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni sat down in front of the cameras in Entebbe and signed the "Anti-Homosexuality Act". Government officials applauded, and schoolchildren celebrated in Kampala. For lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans people in the country, that Monday marked the beginning of a time of fear.
Same-sex sex had already been a crime in Uganda, a legacy of British colonial rule. The new law went much further. So-called "aggravated homosexuality" carried life imprisonment. It was also a crime to "promote" homosexuality or to provide premises for "homosexual purposes". The original 2009 bill by MP David Bahati had even provided for the death penalty.
Museveni had hesitated for a long time. He had experts from the Health Ministry draw up a report. It stated that homosexuality was neither a disease nor an abnormality. The president read the opposite into it and signed. In his speech, he accused Western groups of luring Ugandan children into homosexuality.
The consequences were immediate. Human rights organisations documented arrests, extortion by police officers, dismissals and evictions. Just a few days after the signing, a trans sex worker in Kampala, called "Queen" by her friends, was brutally attacked. She died of her injuries. For fear of being arrested themselves, her friends did not dare go to the police. At least a hundred queer people fled the country in those months.
In the summer, the Constitutional Court struck down the law, but only on formal grounds: parliament had not been quorate when it voted. The relief did not last long. Nine years later, Museveni signed an even harsher law that in certain cases even provides for the death penalty.