East Africa can still afford to be a nicer place for gays
Like I do every so often, on Wednesday, I visited the websites of Reuters and BBC. I was looking for good news about Africa. I found the good news all right, but there was some bad too that was hard to ignore.
The good news was the return to Juba of that hard man named Riek Machar as part of a peace deal reached last month with another hard man named Salva Kiir. Some even harder men from the region were on hand to bless proceedings on what was dubbed peace celebration day.
The former guerrillas turned guns against each other in December 2013, which led to bloodletting, displacement, and ruination of the oil-based economy. It was as if the suffering South Sudanese underwent in the decades before independence in 2011 meant nothing.
President Kiir and soon-again-to-be vice president Machar have another chance to lead. They had better.
Moving on to the bad.
There is not much love for gay people in East Africa. The environment is of hate, bigotry, and ignorance.
In 2013 Uganda passed a draconian law. The courts nullified the Anti-Homosexuality Act, and our dear MPs are still nursing the dream of passing a new one.
The law effectively wanted us to rat on gays and flush them out of society. Tanzania has gone one better and created a squad to hunt down and arrest people in same-sex relationships starting tomorrow — Monday.
Dar es Salaam regional commissioner Paul Makonda (Anaconda sounds more appropriate) said, according to the BBC, that the mandate of the 17-member gang would be to “scrutinise social media platforms to identify people who engage in same-sex relationships”. Other media have the man saying: “…I am announcing this to every citizen of Dar es Salaam. If you know any gays ... report them to me.”
On the same day, Thomson Reuters Foundation, the news agency’s philanthropic arm, also carried a piece on homosexuals in East Africa. Below is a bit of what the story said:
“It wasn’t long after Joe’s father was shot dead for being gay that the 24-year-old Ugandan college student realised the men from his church would be coming for him next.
“First came the anonymous phone calls in the dead of night. Then the chilling text messages detailing how he would be “hunted down”. It was only after he was attacked and lay bruised and bleeding in a public toilet that Joe fled to Kenya.
“But four years on, the country he believed would be a safe haven for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT+) refugees like himself has been more like a living hell.
“He walks the streets of the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, in constant fear of arrest. He is frequently evicted from his lodgings. And with no means of income, he is forced to sell sex for Kshs200 (Shs7,200) through gay dating apps ...
“In Kenya, I can’t even get a job and in Uganda, they will kill me if I return. These are my options. Sometimes I just want to kill myself.”
Joe declined to reveal his full name to the reporters, which is understandable because his tough times could easily get worse.
Back to Dar es Salaam.
Big Man Makonda, reportedly a staunch Christian and close ally of president John Magufuli who himself is no lover of gay people, said at his news conference that he was going after more than gay people.
Lovers of pornography beware. He said that people who do not delete nude pictures from their phones would be in serious trouble.
And so Uganda, with its porn-sniffing committee and machines, is setting quite an example.
It is telling that Mr Makonda talked homosexuality and pornography in the same breath, equating the two, even if sub-consciously.
I believe, however, that the Big Man has better things to do. Or may be he does not.
Bernard Tabaire is a media trainer and commentator on public affairs based in Kampala.
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Twitter:@btabaire
