“We are a society that is not ready for homosexuality and abortion. As Africa, we believe that the institution of the family is at the core of whatever we are doing.” Deputy Speaker Thomas Tayebwa.
Those were Hon Tayebwa’s frank words against homosexuality and abortion rights to the EU delegates attending the 61st session of the African Caribbean and Pacific- European Union (ACP-EU) summit in Maputo, Mozambique in October 2022.
Tayebwa accused the ACP-EU Partnership Agreement for containing a clause that promotes LGBT/homosexuality and abortion, practices he said Uganda will vehemently oppose.
“The EU is demanding that we take a certain route, they should also know the character of our society’, he said.
He received support from the Ugandan delegation he had led, Hon. Theodore Ssekikubo (Lwemiyaga County), Hon.Cecilia (Dokolo District), Hon. Maurice Kibalya (Bugabula South), Hon. Elijah Okupa (Kasilo County), Dr Samuel Opio (Kole North) and Hon. Lucy Akello (Amuru District).
According to Hon. Ogwal, Uganda is not comfortable with the EU’s conditions on sexual orientation and abortion.
“We are all geared up to make sure that whatever decision we take is in the interest of the people whom we represent,’’ she said.
She wondered why the EU would sneak clauses into the agreement yet Uganda has not been shy on its stand on Homosexuality which already has an existing law that criminalizes it.
On 24th February, 2014, H.E the President assented to the anti-homosexuality bill, making it a law amidst debate and controversies from western powers and human rights activists.
Prior, H.E the President had tasked a team of scientists to provide scientific evidence on homosexuality, to no avail.
“We reject the notion that somebody can be homosexual by choice; that a man can choose to love a fellow man; that sexual orientation is a matter of choice. Since my original thesis that there may be people who are born homosexual has been disproved by science, then the homosexuals have lost the argument in Uganda. They should rehabilitate themselves and society should assist them to do so,’’ H.E the President stated while signing the bill into law.
During the annual National Prayer Breakfast which usually precedes the Independence Day celebrations, H.E the President reiterated Uganda’s position on the same, saying such people are still considered as social deviants in the Ugandan society.
He said he resisted pressures from western countries about homosexuality in Uganda because it goes against societal norms.
“We have been having pressures from some of these groups who say there are two ways of life; the normal way and parallel way. We said this is not our interpretation. We know that homosexuals were here; we even have a name for them… but what we knew was that these people were a deviation from normal; and they were not killed. We had a few well-known homosexuals, one of them was a chief, he did a lot of good things, and another one I hear was a king. They were not killed, but they were not praised or promoted, and it was not put out that this is a normal way but a deviation from nature,’’ he said.
Hon Tayebwa and his delegation helped reecho what H.E the President has time and again emphasized that Uganda and Africa at large will never embrace homosexuality or abortion because they are against the values Ugandans dearly uphold.