Uganda wants to make it tougher for persons of same sex to engage in a relationship.
This issue was brought up at the parliament in a bill that is against LGBTQ with a focus on same-sex relationships and gay people.
According to lawmakers, the current ban on same-sex relations is not enough.
The highly conservative and religious east African nation is against LGBTQ and same-sex relations are punishable by up to life in prison.
Over 30 African countries have placed ban same-sex relations. The continent ahs such visible unacceptability for same sex relationship.
However, if the new Ugandan law is passed, the country might appear to be the first to criminalise simply identifying as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ), Human Rights Watch says.
Why The New Law Is Being Introduced
The new Ugandan law is proposed as a private lawmaker’s bill aiming to allow the country to fight “threats to the traditional, heterosexual family”.
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Reuters cites a copy to state that the new bill proposes up to 10 years in prison for any person who “holds out as a lesbian, gay, transgender, a queer or any other sexual or gender identity that is contrary to the binary categories of male and female”.
It also criminalises the “promotion” of homosexuality and “abetting” and “conspiring” to engage in same-sex relations.
This law is quite similar to a law passed in 2013 that stiffened some penalties and criminalised lesbianism.
The 2013 law drew widespread international condemnation before it was struck down by a domestic court on procedural grounds.