The first gay man charged under the new anti-homosexuality law voted in 2023 in Uganda escapes a trial. But state-sponsored homophobia in this East African country, one of the harshest in the world, remains.
This is bad news dressed up as good news coming from Uganda. In this East African state whose anti-homosexuality legislation is regarded as among the harshest in the world, a court dismissed the first case brought after the 2023 vote hardening state homophobia.
The law passed in 2023 provides heavy penalties for people having homosexual relations and for “promoting” homosexuality. An offense of “aggravated homosexuality” is also punishable by the death penalty, a sentence that has not been carried out for years in Uganda. Based on prosecutions started three months after its adoption, the first case heard under this text concerned a man, now 25, accused of “aggravated homosexuality” for “having illicit sexual relations with (…) a 41-year-old adult man”, according to the initial indictment read by the Agence France-Presse (AFP). In January 2024, the facts were reclassified as “crimes against nature for having had sexual relations contrary to the natural order”, punishable by life imprisonment.
“Anyone can still be arrested…”
On Monday, February 2, however, the court dismissed the case, deeming that the accused was “mentally unstable and that he did not understand the course of the trial”, his lawyer, Me Douglas Mawadri, explained to AFP. The defense argued that the accused had developed psychosis and had become schizophrenic as a result of the 350 days he had spent in provisional detention, before being released on bail.
Asked by AFP to react to this news, human rights activists are divided on this decision. “A major breakthrough that should have intervened sooner”, commented Richard Lusimbo, the LGBT+ rights activist, who said that the lengthy pre-trial detention of the accused constitutes an “injustice at its peak”. The decision “creates a precedent” and amounts to a “victory for the victims”, rejoiced Ugandan human rights defender Frank Mugashi. “The law on homosexuality and the provisions of the Penal Code prohibiting consensual acts between adults of the same sex are still in force,” reminded Oryem Nyeko, author of a Human Rights Watch (HRW) report published in May on the subject. And to recall: “That means anyone can still be arrested and prosecuted under this law that tramples rights.”
