Vanity Fair reports that although the section of the bill to punish gays and lesbians with the death penalty has been changed, an amended version will end health and sexualiy programs and make it illegal for gays to exist.
Money from evangelical religious groups in the US contines to fund the anti-gay rhetoric.
Though widespread international criticism, especially from the United States, derailed the bill in its original form and forced Uganda to drop its death-penalty provision, parliament is set to discreetly pass amendments that would prevent all residents and local and international non-profit organizations from “promoting,” advocating, or associating any of their activities with homosexuality.
The punishment would effectively end all health and sexuality programs geared towards gays and lesbians, allow the government to round up and punish activists at will, and make it essentially illegal for gays to exist.
Warren Throckmorton has checked further and isn’t so sure the bill will be considered in the legislature’s upcoming final session.
Anglican priest, the Rev. Canon Gideon Byamugisha and a few others have joined the forces against this bill:
In the meantime, activists have secured the support of influential Ugandans including Reverend Canon Gideon Byamugisha and a few politicians who see the bill as a human-rights issue. Activists also stormed the fading parliament building in March with a petition demanding the bill be withdrawn after the speaker agreed to hear them out in a surprising about-face. The meeting soon turned into an impromptu press conference. But despite all the attention and seemingly more open outlook of some parliamentarians, the bill’s opponents are far from optimistic.
Reverend Canon Gideon Byamugish, (born 1959) is an Anglican priest in Uganda with a parish outside of Kampala. In 1992, he became the first religious leader in Africa to publicly announce that he was HIV positive. In 2009, Byamugisha received the 26th annual Niwano Peace Prize “in recognition of his work to uphold the dignity and human rights of people living with HIV/AIDS”.
Byamugisha organized the African Network of Religious Leaders Living with and Personally Affected HIV and Aids (ANERELA) in 2003, and in 2006 started a shelter for orphans of AIDS victims. He lives with his wife and three HIV negative children.
The Lead has reported on Canon Gideon Byamugisha’s good work here, here, and here.