Uganda seems to be anti-gay

[vivfox]

Uganda Cleric Calls For Annihilation Of Gays
(Kampala) Uganda's leading Muslim cleric has proposed to President Yoweri Museveni that gays be rounded up and marooned on an island in Lake Victoria until they die.

Sheikh Ramathan Shaban Mubajje told reporters of his plan following a much publicized meeting with Museveni.

"I asked President Museveni to get us an island on Lake Victoria and we take these homosexuals and they die out there," Mubajje told a news conference.

"If they die there then we shall have no more homosexuals in the country."

Others at the meeting reportedly said that the president did not respond to the suggestion.

Uganda outlaws male homosexuality, under laws originally imposed by the British colonizers in the nineteenth century. Offenders can face a maximum sentence of life imprisonment

Mubajje's remarks follow similar threats by other Islamic leaders.

Recently, Muslim Tabliqh youth announced a plan to form an 'Anti-Gay Squad' to fight homosexuality in Uganda.

On 28 August 2007, Sheikh Multah Bukenya, a senior cleric in the Tabliqh Organization, was quoted during prayers at Noor Mosque in Kampala as saying that his followers are "ready to act swiftly and form this squad that will wipe out all abnormal practices like homosexuality in our society."

Anti-gay attacks are commonplace in Uganda but have been increasing since August when Ugandan LGBT rights groups for the first time held a public news conference to demand basic civil rights. (story) Many of the participants wore disguises out of fears of government reprisals.

A week later supporters of a coalition of Christian and Muslim religious groups filled a downtown stadium demanding mass arrests of gays.

Last week the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission said that it had uncovered evidence that the Bush administration has funded groups in Uganda that actively promote violence and discrimination against lesbians and gay men. (story)

Among those receiving money, according to US government records, is Uganda Muslim Tabliqh, and the Makerere University Community Church,

The church's leader, Pastor Martin Ssempa, was a leading organizer of the anti-gay rally in Kampala.

Ssempa and his coalition, which includes Roman Catholics, Anglicans, Baptists, Seventh Day Adventists, and Evangelicals, also have threatened the safety of Ugandan LGBT rights activists by posting their names, photos and addresses on a website.


http://www.gbmnews.com/articles/1700...ays/Page1.html