Is homophobia on the rise in the Commonwealth’s African member states?
by The Commonwealth Conversation Is homophobia a real problem in the African Commonwealth, thus contradicting the high human-rights standards the association is supposed to uphold? Recent months have seen the issue of homosexuality being widely debated in various African member states of the Commonwealth. Uganda’s proposed ‘Anti-Homosexuality Bill 2009’, calling for the execution of ‘repeat homosexual offenders’, has been internationally condemned. Late last year, Rwanda came close to criminalising homosexuality for the first time when its penal code was being revised. Meanwhile, an engaged gay couple in Malawi were recently arrested and charged with ‘unnatural offences’. Is homophobia a real problem in the African Commonwealth, thus contradicting the high human-rights standards the association is supposed to uphold? Below is a moving testimony from John, a Ugandan gay man: Uganda is one of the African countries which treats its gay people worse than it treats even animals. Your family
