REPORT: UGANDA GOV TO APPEAL ANTI-GAY LAW RULING

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MP David Bahati, author of the Anti-Homosexuality Act

The author of the Anti-Homosexuality Act says that the Ugandan government will fight to overturn today’s Constitutional Court repeal of the horrific law (details here).

According to the Daily Monitor newspaper, MP David Bahati, who masterminded the legislation, told journalists that the Attorney General will petition the Supreme Court to review Friday’s landmark ruling, seen as a major victory for the country’s LGBT community.

“The court case ruling is no victory at all, the morals of the people of Uganda will prevail,” Bahati said in a press conference after the law was struck down.

He added: “Our competent legal team will continue to petition the Supreme Court and I believe we will win.”

Bahati’s original bill, introduced in 2009, allowed for the death penalty in cases of “aggravated homosexuality”, but the final version of the law reduced this to life imprisonment.

The Constitutional Court’s five justices nullified the Anti-Homosexuality Act because they found that there were not enough lawmakers present at the time of the parliamentary vote, as legally required under law.

Pastor Martin Ssempa, one of the most high-profile homophobic champions of the law, suggested that the court’s ruling may have been politically influenced in light of President Museveni attending the US-Africa Leaders Summit in Washington next week.

“We’re wondering whether the ruling is in any way related to the president’s travel to America because Obama has made it clear his No. 1 policy agenda is advancing homosexualism,” he said.

Frank Mugisha, executive director of Sexual Minorities Uganda, told Reuters that he welcomed the court’s decision but said that he would have preferred if the judge who issued the ruling had gone into the substance of the petition by LGBT rights activists, instead of ruling on the process of how it was passed.

“That’s where he would have realised that the law violates the Constitution of Uganda and am sure he would have gone ahead to declare homosexuality legal in Uganda,” he said.

Although the Anti-Homosexuality Act has been nullified, previous colonial-era legislation criminalising gay sex remains in force; allowing the state to imprison anyone found guilty for life.

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