According to spokesman Nsimbe Kassim, the Anti-Homosexuality Bill is still in committee and will not be debated today. Kassim told me that the report from the Legal and Parliamentary Affairs committee will not come before Parliament today but will probably come up next week. The main business today is more work on the bills relating to the oil industry in Uganda. According to yesterday’s agenda, Parliament must get through two Petroleum Bills, the Accountants Bill, a resolution to encourage a bail out of a steel mill and consideration of a report on the energy sector before debate on the anti-gay bill.
UPDATE: In the category of “I’ll believe it when I see it” is this report from the BBC. In May 2011, MPs said the death penalty had been dropped when in fact it was still in the bill.
UPDATE: This NTV report lends some credibility to the BBC story above. Committee chair Stephen Tashobya is quoted as saying the report is complete and others speaking off camera say that the penalty for “aggravated homosexuality” will now be life in prison. This report indicates that action on the bill will take place next week.
Whether David Bahati* should also bring an Anti-Infidelity Bill, perhaps?
After all, marital infidelity is considered to be a (if not THE) principal HIV risk factor in Uganda these days.
* I’ve recently heard that are reasons why he might NOT wish to sponsor such a bill!!!
@ Frank
If the world had ‘done nothing’ three years ago, the Bill, complete with hanging and that ‘thou shalt be an informant’ clause, would have become law.
‘Maazi’ (who is not quite ‘noble’ enough to tell us who he really is) should be grateful to us since he has claimed in the past not to support the original Bill.
While it is not yet known exactly what Tashobya’s report contains, it is unlikely to contain any real ‘changes of substance’ (life in a UG prison is hardly much better than a ‘quick’ death), contrary to claims made by ‘Maazi’ and others; ‘consenting adults’, as well as those consistently expressing support for them, would still face the most severe penalties just about anywhere in the world. That’s why the focus is so firmly on Uganda, despite other countries having more limited anti-gay ‘laws’. Bahati has put his country ‘centre-stage’ in this battle …
Santa Kadaga’s legacy in history, sadly, is the least concern here.
(I rather suspected you wouldn’t.)
* A vote for the Bill is a vote for HIV. *
By the way, ‘Maazi NCO’, do you categorically deny that David Bahati has had any extra-marital affairs?
If this is an attempt to smear David Bahati (MP, Ndorwa West) with unfounded innuendoes then you are doing a terribly clumsy job of it.
The “idiots” enjoy the full support of the populace in tackling the abominable sex crime of gayism. The “idiots” don’t care what anarchic sexual hedonists in Europe and North America think about them.
Hmmm…preparing for yet another gay propagandist raid on the email accounts for MPs?? The last time, the in-boxes of several MPs were overloaded with spam emails from hundreds of crazy gay sex propagandists from the Western world. It seems these propagandists cannot stop dreaming of a mythical future where Uganda will be reduced to the status of a Thailand-style exotic gay sex tourist paradise.
Is that the new gay sex propagandist line now? BTW, the slogan sounds “cool” for the Euro-American Gay Sex Propagandist Lobby
Just heard that it is a May 2011 style ‘change of wording’ this time as well.
Will try to get confirmation a.s.a.p..
Vital of course, to remember that the last we were told ‘death penalty dropped’, they were lying (just as certain anti-gay Ugandan politicians allegedly lie to their wives).
These idiot politicos seem to completely fail to understand that the death penalty is no longer the issue (if ever it is really was).
The BBC has been ‘getting the Bill wrong’ for a long time.
Agreed. But her predicament might provide a useful ‘lesson’ for other politicians.
Santa Kadaga’s legacy in history, sadly, is the least concern here.
Agreed. But her predicament might provide a useful ‘lesson’ for other politicians.
Miss Kadaga may be ‘between a rock and hard place’. If the Bill fails, or is further delayed, she will look weak and stupid; if it passes, she will be lumbered with a rather unflattering ‘gay-bashing’ legacy. Meanwhile, presidential rivals look on …
I’ve noticed that, today, there’s an ‘image building’ exercise going on: http://www.parliament.go.ug/new/index.php/about-parliament/parliamentary-news/135-speaker-kadaga-wins-african-influential-amazon-award
And still no Order Paper on the website …
I keep hearing that many ordinary Ugandans have ‘lost interest’ in the Bill, especially perhaps as there are, I gather, reports of austerity measures in the pipeline, as the UG budget is needing to be ‘brought into balance’ after recent ‘grant suspensions’ over corruption allegations.
Miss Kadaga may be ‘between a rock and hard place’. If the Bill fails, or is further delayed, she will look weak and stupid; if it passes, she will be lumbered with a rather unflattering ‘gay-bashing’ legacy. Meanwhile, presidential rivals look on …
I’ve noticed that, today, there’s an ‘image building’ exercise going on: http://www.parliament.go.ug/new/index.php/about-parliament/parliamentary-news/135-speaker-kadaga-wins-african-influential-amazon-award
And still no Order Paper on the website …
I keep hearing that many ordinary Ugandans have ‘lost interest’ in the Bill, especially perhaps as there are, I gather, reports of austerity measures in the pipeline, as the UG budget is needing to be ‘brought into balance’ after recent ‘grant suspensions’ over corruption allegations.
@ Frank
If the world had ‘done nothing’ three years ago, the Bill, complete with hanging and that ‘thou shalt be an informant’ clause, would have become law.
‘Maazi’ (who is not quite ‘noble’ enough to tell us who he really is) should be grateful to us since he has claimed in the past not to support the original Bill.
While it is not yet known exactly what Tashobya’s report contains, it is unlikely to contain any real ‘changes of substance’ (life in a UG prison is hardly much better than a ‘quick’ death), contrary to claims made by ‘Maazi’ and others; ‘consenting adults’, as well as those consistently expressing support for them, would still face the most severe penalties just about anywhere in the world. That’s why the focus is so firmly on Uganda, despite other countries having more limited anti-gay ‘laws’. Bahati has put his country ‘centre-stage’ in this battle …
* A vote for the Bill is a vote for HIV. *
Of all the things you write, the one that most amazes me, Amazing Mr Maazi, is that you think this proposed dracoian law could somehow improve Uganda’s AIDS situation. Men who have sex with men (MSM) are one if the key vectors in the spread of the disease. You seem to think that further criminalising them will help; I see that putting MSM further underground than they already are will make them even more reluctant to deal constructively with the threat of HIV infection and its consequences than they already are. The spread of the disease is far more liable to increase as a result. This horrid bill, in this particular way of looking at it, is akin to my beloved Catholic church’s appalling teaching on condom use in the face of this deadly disease. The fact that abstinence doesn’t happen for so many people gets left out – oh, and terribly unfortunate, of course, huge numbers of people die. We live in a world of very warped thinking, you know.
Homosexuality is a fact of life – even in Africa. Homophobia is what has been imported into Africa, not homosexuality: you already have recognised this in earlier discussion, though you know it can suit your argument to ignore it. Homophobia and fundamentalist religion are proving to be a lethal cocktail, as evidenced directly by this proposed pogrom legislation. AIDS too is a fact if life – especially, sadly, in Africa. Until you can find constructive adult ways of dealing with both of these facts of life, the disease can never be contained. Hate based legislation – on the false premises of cultural imperative and unChristian fundamentalism – is NOT the way to do this.
I ask myself, is this terrible escapade simply a way for Ugandan politicians to divert public attention away from other sins if omission and commission by the leaders of your country – you included? Or is it that Ugandan legislators en bloc are affronted that outsiders have had the cheek to tell you that what you are proposing to do is unacceptable. If, indeed, the outside world had kept its collective mouth should, is it possible this deadly bill would have been discarded with little or no fanfare as it rightly should have been long ago. What price righteousness? To be honest, I could this against myself in other, hopefully lesser, regards also. We are all so damn human!
Let me say this to you, though, I honestly appreciate that someone of your opinion is prepared to engage in a discussion like this. Maybe that’s one of the few good things that comes out of this terrible travesty. So often, noble Maazi, the differing sides in culture shift as big as this simply don’t engage. Btw, it is my honest belief that the hardest thing in the world to change is attitude – our own, never mind anyone else’s.
Of all the things you write, the one that most amazes me, Amazing Mr Maazi, is that you think this proposed dracoian law could somehow improve Uganda’s AIDS situation. Men who have sex with men (MSM) are one if the key vectors in the spread of the disease. You seem to think that further criminalising them will help; I see that putting MSM further underground than they already are will make them even more reluctant to deal constructively with the threat of HIV infection and its consequences than they already are. The spread of the disease is far more liable to increase as a result. This horrid bill, in this particular way of looking at it, is akin to my beloved Catholic church’s appalling teaching on condom use in the face of this deadly disease. The fact that abstinence doesn’t happen for so many people gets left out – oh, and terribly unfortunate, of course, huge numbers of people die. We live in a world of very warped thinking, you know.
Homosexuality is a fact of life – even in Africa. Homophobia is what has been imported into Africa, not homosexuality: you already have recognised this in earlier discussion, though you know it can suit your argument to ignore it. Homophobia and fundamentalist religion are proving to be a lethal cocktail, as evidenced directly by this proposed pogrom legislation. AIDS too is a fact if life – especially, sadly, in Africa. Until you can find constructive adult ways of dealing with both of these facts of life, the disease can never be contained. Hate based legislation – on the false premises of cultural imperative and unChristian fundamentalism – is NOT the way to do this.
I ask myself, is this terrible escapade simply a way for Ugandan politicians to divert public attention away from other sins if omission and commission by the leaders of your country – you included? Or is it that Ugandan legislators en bloc are affronted that outsiders have had the cheek to tell you that what you are proposing to do is unacceptable. If, indeed, the outside world had kept its collective mouth should, is it possible this deadly bill would have been discarded with little or no fanfare as it rightly should have been long ago. What price righteousness? To be honest, I could this against myself in other, hopefully lesser, regards also. We are all so damn human!
Let me say this to you, though, I honestly appreciate that someone of your opinion is prepared to engage in a discussion like this. Maybe that’s one of the few good things that comes out of this terrible travesty. So often, noble Maazi, the differing sides in culture shift as big as this simply don’t engage. Btw, it is my honest belief that the hardest thing in the world to change is attitude – our own, never mind anyone else’s.
(The HIV Control Bill is not without its ‘problems’, of course.)
(It may of course be that Bahati’s private life is as ‘clean as a whistle’, and as ‘pure the driven snow’. Who knows? :-D)
Moving on …
This is worth seeing. It’s something that Yosari Bihande Bwambale MP wrote to an Australian human rights campaigner yesterday.
“[A]nti homosexuality bill is not intended to kill people like you. What we want is
to protect our children from perverts like you to infect our children with bad
habits and for them to produce grand kids.In our country its criminal to have
sexual intercourse with children under 18 years. This law does not include
homos. Its also criminal to intentionaly infect your partner wit hiv aids. Our
laws were not covering homos. So we are recognising homosexuality and
lesbianism as a form of sexual intercourse. Of course defilment and rape are
capital offences which atract deat sentense wheather your homo or not. we are
also a religius countrey which does not agree with homosexuality. So please
respect us as sovereign and therefore free to enact laws that we fell are just
for our own good. Bihande B.Y [MP] I support and will pass the Bill for
posterity.”
He is selling the ‘there’s-no-law-to-protect-children’ lie; maybe he actually believes it. (Honesty might not be his strongest suit generally: http://www.newvision.co.ug/news/630080-court-fines-mp-sh6m-for-embezzling-sh20m.html)
Well, many of us who are NOT Uganda MPs DO know about Penal Code 129. Maybe I should write and tell him? Then he could vote against the bill with with clear conscience!
(Of course he also seems to be muddling the Bahati Bill with the HIV Control Bill – an understandable error, perhaps!)
(The HIV Control Bill is not without its ‘problems’, of course.)
(It may of course be that Bahati’s private life is as ‘clean as a whistle’, and as ‘pure the driven snow’. Who knows? :-D)
Moving on …
This is worth seeing. It’s something that Yosari Bihande Bwambale MP wrote to an Australian human rights campaigner yesterday.
“[A]nti homosexuality bill is not intended to kill people like you. What we want is
to protect our children from perverts like you to infect our children with bad
habits and for them to produce grand kids.In our country its criminal to have
sexual intercourse with children under 18 years. This law does not include
homos. Its also criminal to intentionaly infect your partner wit hiv aids. Our
laws were not covering homos. So we are recognising homosexuality and
lesbianism as a form of sexual intercourse. Of course defilment and rape are
capital offences which atract deat sentense wheather your homo or not. we are
also a religius countrey which does not agree with homosexuality. So please
respect us as sovereign and therefore free to enact laws that we fell are just
for our own good. Bihande B.Y [MP] I support and will pass the Bill for
posterity.”
He is selling the ‘there’s-no-law-to-protect-children’ lie; maybe he actually believes it. (Honesty might not be his strongest suit generally: http://www.newvision.co.ug/news/630080-court-fines-mp-sh6m-for-embezzling-sh20m.html)
Well, many of us who are NOT Uganda MPs DO know about Penal Code 129. Maybe I should write and tell him? Then he could vote against the bill with with clear conscience!
(Of course he also seems to be muddling the Bahati Bill with the HIV Control Bill – an understandable error, perhaps!)
(I rather suspected you wouldn’t.)
By the way, ‘Maazi NCO’, do you categorically deny that David Bahati has had any extra-marital affairs?
The only ‘substantial amendments’ of any real ‘substance’ would be the following:-
1. Strike out any measures criminalizing ‘consenting adults’;
2. Strike out any measures criminalising freedom of speech, conscience and peaceful assembly.
Any other changes would simply be ‘window dressing’ designed to deceive and made with a view to trying to wriggle out of a tight spot.
So we’ll see if there are any ‘substantial amendments’ when the report breaks cover …
* A vote for the (so-called ‘revised’) Bill is (as far as what we’ve heard today is concerned) a vote for HIV. *
Taking each of your four points in turn …
I have some ‘foundation’ for my innuendo, don’t you worry! Unlike some other people I could mention, I don’t say things like that without good reason. 🙂
I think the ‘idiots’ do indeed think that taking away the death penalty will make a difference. It won’t. (And if they don’t care what we thing, why drop – or pretend to drop it at all?)
Have you signed the petition yet?
It’s a good line – backed by plenty of expert opinion, so I’ll say it again (with one small addition) …
* A vote for the (so-called ‘revised’) Bill is vote for HIV. *
The MP is merely repeating what I have been saying in these blog pages for a long time now. The bill has been revised extensively. Until it is revealed for all to see, it is rather pointless making all these ridiculous conjectures that Richard Willmer and his alarmist gay sex co-travellers are fond of posting here repeatedly like a broken record playing on an endless loop
If this is an attempt to smear David Bahati (MP, Ndorwa West) with unfounded innuendoes then you are doing a terribly clumsy job of it.
The “idiots” enjoy the full support of the populace in tackling the abominable sex crime of gayism. The “idiots” don’t care what anarchic sexual hedonists in Europe and North America think about them.
Hmmm…preparing for yet another gay propagandist raid on the email accounts for MPs?? The last time, the in-boxes of several MPs were overloaded with spam emails from hundreds of crazy gay sex propagandists from the Western world. It seems these propagandists cannot stop dreaming of a mythical future where Uganda will be reduced to the status of a Thailand-style exotic gay sex tourist paradise.
Is that the new gay sex propagandist line now? BTW, the slogan sounds “cool” for the Euro-American Gay Sex Propagandist Lobby
Alarm over HIV implications of (even a ‘revised’0 Bahati Bill: http://www.trust.org/alertnet/news/ugandas-anti-homosexuality-bill-would-be-disastrous-for-hiv-response
The ‘international’ nature of HIV makes the Bill a matter for Uganda’s neighbours and others.
* A vote for the Bill is a vote for HIV *
The only ‘substantial amendments’ of any real ‘substance’ would be the following:-
1. Strike out any measures criminalizing ‘consenting adults’;
2. Strike out any measures criminalising freedom of speech, conscience and peaceful assembly.
Any other changes would simply be ‘window dressing’ designed to deceive and made with a view to trying to wriggle out of a tight spot.
So we’ll see if there are any ‘substantial amendments’ when the report breaks cover …
* A vote for the (so-called ‘revised’) Bill is (as far as what we’ve heard today is concerned) a vote for HIV. *
Taking each of your four points in turn …
I have some ‘foundation’ for my innuendo, don’t you worry! Unlike some other people I could mention, I don’t say things like that without good reason. 🙂
I think the ‘idiots’ do indeed think that taking away the death penalty will make a difference. It won’t. (And if they don’t care what we thing, why drop – or pretend to drop it at all?)
Have you signed the petition yet?
It’s a good line – backed by plenty of expert opinion, so I’ll say it again (with one small addition) …
* A vote for the (so-called ‘revised’) Bill is vote for HIV. *
The MP is merely repeating what I have been saying in these blog pages for a long time now. The bill has been revised extensively. Until it is revealed for all to see, it is rather pointless making all these ridiculous conjectures that Richard Willmer and his alarmist gay sex co-travellers are fond of posting here repeatedly like a broken record playing on an endless loop
They’ve said this kind of thing before.
These people are NOT to be trusted. They are politicians …
Let’s see what actually transpires.
Anyway the death penalty is not the issue (except for ‘exposing possible lies’); it is the criminalization of consensual relations, the attack on freedom of speech, conscience and peaceful assembly, and the attempt to deny essentials services to a particular group of persons.
Alarm over HIV implications of (even a ‘revised’0 Bahati Bill: http://www.trust.org/alertnet/news/ugandas-anti-homosexuality-bill-would-be-disastrous-for-hiv-response
The ‘international’ nature of HIV makes the Bill a matter for Uganda’s neighbours and others.
* A vote for the Bill is a vote for HIV *
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-20463887
MP Medard Segona said “substantial amendments” had been made to the bill but said he was not allowed to reveal further details.
….
Such offences would now be punished with life imprisonment, it is understood.
The original bill also prohibited the “promotion” of gay rights and called for the punishment of anyone who “funds or sponsors homosexuality” or “abets homosexuality”.
Mr Bahati has previously said that the death penalty provision would be dropped but this has not been confirmed until now.
Mr Segona, who is on the Legal and Parliamentary committee of Uganda’s parliament, told the BBC: “I can confirm it has been dropped.”
“Some of us who are human rights activists would discourage the death penalty,” he said.
Well, at least it looks as if we have the weekend to ‘ramp up’ the campaign. I’ve been on to those who receive information from me to warn them about ‘tricks with wording’ a la May 2011.
Here’s the Avaaz petition, for anyone who interested: http://www.avaaz.org/en/24_hours_to_stop_the_uganda_antigay_attack_nm/?dty
There are others …
But the death penalty is not really the issue (any more) – except with regard to continuing to expose possible lies on the part of supporters of the Bill. The debate has moved on; it’s just Bahati & Co. who are stuck in the past.
Just heard that it is a May 2011 style ‘change of wording’ this time as well.
Will try to get confirmation a.s.a.p..
Vital of course, to remember that the last we were told ‘death penalty dropped’, they were lying (just as certain anti-gay Ugandan politicians allegedly lie to their wives).
These idiot politicos seem to completely fail to understand that the death penalty is no longer the issue (if ever it is really was).
The BBC has been ‘getting the Bill wrong’ for a long time.
Whether David Bahati* should also bring an Anti-Infidelity Bill, perhaps?
After all, marital infidelity is considered to be a (if not THE) principal HIV risk factor in Uganda these days.
* I’ve recently heard that are reasons why he might NOT wish to sponsor such a bill!!!
What is there to debate in such an overtly anti-gay mob of legislators?
They’ve said this kind of thing before.
These people are NOT to be trusted. They are politicians …
Let’s see what actually transpires.
Anyway the death penalty is not the issue (except for ‘exposing possible lies’); it is the criminalization of consensual relations, the attack on freedom of speech, conscience and peaceful assembly, and the attempt to deny essentials services to a particular group of persons.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-20463887
MP Medard Segona said “substantial amendments” had been made to the bill but said he was not allowed to reveal further details.
….
Such offences would now be punished with life imprisonment, it is understood.
The original bill also prohibited the “promotion” of gay rights and called for the punishment of anyone who “funds or sponsors homosexuality” or “abets homosexuality”.
Mr Bahati has previously said that the death penalty provision would be dropped but this has not been confirmed until now.
Mr Segona, who is on the Legal and Parliamentary committee of Uganda’s parliament, told the BBC: “I can confirm it has been dropped.”
“Some of us who are human rights activists would discourage the death penalty,” he said.
Well, at least it looks as if we have the weekend to ‘ramp up’ the campaign. I’ve been on to those who receive information from me to warn them about ‘tricks with wording’ a la May 2011.
Here’s the Avaaz petition, for anyone who interested: http://www.avaaz.org/en/24_hours_to_stop_the_uganda_antigay_attack_nm/?dty
There are others …
But the death penalty is not really the issue (any more) – except with regard to continuing to expose possible lies on the part of supporters of the Bill. The debate has moved on; it’s just Bahati & Co. who are stuck in the past.
What is there to debate in such an overtly anti-gay mob of legislators?