Improper Human Rights: Ghana and Uganda

Tongue in cheek, that title.
There is this organisation in Ghana a promoter of ‘Proper Human Rights’. Apparently its promotion of proper human rights includes support of the anti-LGBTQ+ bill currently in Ghana’s parliament.
And Stephen Kaziimba, Archbishop of the Church of Uganda, Anglican also had an interesting argument. As he whipped the Anti-Homosexuality Act, 2023 he intimated that the LGBTQ+ agenda had corrupted ‘proper human rights’

Sarcasm over the top? No.
Dr Justine Appiah Kubi is an executive member of the Coalition for Proper Human Sexual Rights and Family Values,  He supports the Ghana anti-homosexuality bill,  the ‘Promotion of Proper Human Sexual Rights and Ghanaian Family Values Bill, 2022’;.
A proud Ghanaian, he lauds the Ghanaian bill for being not as intolerant as the Ugandan law…, and bearing the beneficence and tolerance of Ghanaian culture.
(I am Ugandan…, I would agree as to Ugandan intolerance, if I didn’t know that at the moment there are reports of Ghanaian Kuchus being viciously attacked, stabbed in broad day light, on the streets of Accra, and Ghanaian twitterati championing the ‘straightening’.)

Says Justine Appiah Kubi;

“.., the bill is tolerant enough to ensure that no harm befalls individuals in the queer community, although Ghanaians might not condone LGBT and its activities.

This level of tolerance, Dr. Appiah-Kubi emphasised, is reflective of the Ghanaian culture.

Additionally, he described the bill as a good one, explaining that, “the spirit of the bill wasn’t necessarily to really hurt people who are into homosexuality, but really to prevent these absurd, LGBT things that are coming to nations and using political strategies, using UN, using the other CSOs” to champion their agenda.”

 

What do I know about Human Rights?

Actually I know very little. Surface stuff. It is human rights. Concerns human beings. And rights being what we believe human beings are supposedly entitled to. And rights imply responsibilities.

What does the Ghana’s anti-LGBTQ+ bill actually state? I posted what could be gathered from the media on Ghana’s bill.

 

·         Identifying as LGBT is criminalised. 3 years in prison.

·         Advocacy is criminalised. 10 years in prison
Campaigning for LGBT rights, dissemination of information

·         Conversion therapy (from LGBTQ to straight sexual orientation!) is validated.

·         limits provision of health services to the LGBTQ+ community. Including HIV services.

·         encourages citizens to report neighbours that are homosexual.

 

Last time looked into the mirror, I was a human being.
We are human beings, and as such, human rights do concern us. Personally, I would think that that is hard to parse.
Stephen Kaziimba, Archbishop is not convinced.

Here is what the Archbishop of the Church of Uganda, Anglican, Dr Steven Kaziimba Mugalu had to say, on at least 3 occasions, when he was whipping up pressure on the President to sign the bill into law.

 

“Homosexuality is currently a challenge because it is being forced on us by foreign actors against our will, against our culture, and against our religious beliefs. They disguise themselves as human rights activists but are corrupting real human rights by adding LGBTQI+ to their agenda,” he said.
the pre-Easter message from the Archbishop.

 

““They disguise themselves as “human rights activists,” but are corrupting real human rights by adding LGBTQI+ to their agenda.”
That was the Easter Sunday summon, 2023

 

“being forced on us by outside, foreign actors against our will, against our culture, and against our religious beliefs. They disguise themselves as “human rights activists,” but are corrupting real human rights by adding LGBTQ to their agenda.”
lavish thanks to the President for signing the Bill into law.

 

So, what is the promotion of human rights with the exclusion of LGBTQ+ rights?
Now, that is the true head scratching moment.
Are Kuchus human? Are African LGBTQ+ people actual living human beings? Are they worth inclusion in the conversation about basic, inviolable rights that other human beings, other Africans, are entitled to?

Not rhetorical.
Ghanaian industrialist, William Mensah-Ansah was quite confused and confusing about the issue.
How do you protect individual human rights without recognising that LGBTQ+ Africans are actually individuals whose rights have to be protected? He was confused, but advocates a common African position in the African Charter for African nations around the exclusion of rights for Kuchus. LGBTQ+ Africans.

Are Kuchus, LGBTQ+ Africans human enough to be included in the Human Rights that the rest of African human beings should enjoy? A profound question, because, in the African, Ugandan and Ghanaian and other context, LGBTQ+ rights are so ‘foreign’ that they cannot even think of rights for the homosexual. We have been thoroughly dehumanised, in their eyes. No longer human, it is okay to kill us, legally in the eyes of the law. Because we are inhuman.

Rhetorical flourishes those? I really, really wish it was so. But, my dear brothers and sisters, my fellow Africans, do not really think the LGBTQ+ human being is human, even our African-ness is debatable.

 

gug

A Question of Consenting to Sex: Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Act, 2023 the Text

 

Two or more adults meet, like each other, and decide to have sex. Seems like a very normal thing.

Not if they are Kuchus in Uganda. The Anti-Homosexuality Act of 2023 stands in the way.
Reading through the text of the Bill 2023 and the Act 2023 can impress one on the depths of ignorance that Ugandan heterosexuals have about gay sex. A good dose of high school education on sex and sexuality should cure ignorance.
Unfortunately, the real problem is prejudice.

One is never adult enough to consent to ‘Homosexual’ sex, according to the text of Anti-Homosexuality Bill and Act 2023.
The underlying sense is that in homosexual sex, BECAUSE it is homosexual sex, there is an aggressor (the offender) and there is a victim. ALWAYS. That is why the preamble admits, all same sex sex is supposed to be outlawed in God’s Holy Land, Uganda.
The sense of ‘victimhood’ and victimising is also very strong.
We are normal human beings, with normal emotions, engaging in an act of intimacy that we willingly consent too (with or without the consent of the State. And why should the State be involved, for goodness’ sake?)

Consent (to sex) is not a defence.
What does that statement mean?
And why does the State even have to come into our mutual deal to have some fun together? The Anti-Homosexuality Act 2023 of Uganda baldly states;

~~~

6.    Consent to sexual act is no defence

The consent of a person to commit a sexual act shall not constitute a defence to a charge under this Act.

~~~

The Anti-Homosexual Act, 2023 also strips certain adults of the right to have sex. They cannot consent to having sex with me, as adult human beings.

Under the ‘Aggravated Homosexuality’ part of the Anti-Homosexuality Act, 2023; which already entitles me the Death Penalty as a Serial Offender the following embellishments  would earn me the Death Penalty.

~~~

 

 (e)   the offender is a person in authority over the person against whom the offence is committed;

“person in authority” means a person who is charged with the duty or responsibility for the health, welfare or supervision of a person

~~~

Does it mean that being ‘in authority’ robs them of ability to consent to sex is permanently?

~~~

(f)    the person against whom the offence is committed is a person with a disability or suffers a disability as a result of the sexual act

Helpfully, in the preliminaries, “disability” is helpfully defined.

 

“disability” means a substantial limitation of daily life activities caused by physical, mental or sensory impairment and environment barriers resulting in limited participation;

~~~

A very broad, all encompassing definition. If I am caught having sex with a ‘disabled’ person, I get the Death Penalty. I am the offender, they are the ‘victim’.

Questions:

·         Does a ‘person with disability’ (in Uganda,) have no ability to have sex?

·         Or the ‘person with disability’ has no ability to consent to sex?

·         Or the ‘person with disability’ cannot be LGBTQ+ or homosexual? That seems to be the underlying assumption. They are disabled, they have no sexuality.

          ~~~

(g)    the person against whom the offence is committed is a person with mental illness, …

~~~

Mentally challenged adults cannot consent to have sex? Or the state permanently reserves the right of the mentally challenged adult to sex? Or is it that the mentally challenged adult should first petition the State for the right to have sex consensually? ‘Mental illness’ is a very broad category.
The law is a wonderful ass.

          ~~~

(h)    the person against whom the offence is committed is of advanced age;

‘advanced age’ as defined in the Act;

Adults older than 75 years of age

~~~

Apparently, our MPs believe advanced age robs one of the ability to have or consent to sex, or even be gay!

The psychology of victimhood demands a victim, (above are all examples of ‘victims’) of my heinous person, me the homosexual who did the victimisation. The Anti-Homosexuality Act 2023 even defines the victim of homosexuality…

~~~

“victim of the offence” means—

(b) a person suffering from mental illness or any other form of disability against whom the offence of aggravated homosexuality has been committed

~~~

(a) is the child victim, (b) is the victim of rape…, at least as commonly defined.

Ugandans have a unique take of the English language, especially with regard to what they call ‘homosexuality’.
It is all a bit of madness. Ignorance, a heavy dose of disinformation, misinformation and sheer big headed prejudice is the colour of that legislation.

Ugandan kuchus are in a hopeless legal hell.

 

gug.

Calling out the Ugandan Catholic Church’s Hypocritical Silence…

 

And, it is not poor old gug. Someone else, some other people noted the deafening silence from the Uganda Catholic Church Fathers who are still ‘waiting for the entire bill’ to be presented to them.

Here are Archbishop Ssemogerere’s own parsed words…

 

“the Catholic Church in Uganda will come up with one position after analysing and discussing the Anti-Homosexuality Bill, 2023, which Parliament passed on March 21.
“Regarding what has come out of Parliament once we have the entire Bill, as Fathers of the Catholic Church we will come together to discuss that Bill and give the position of the Catholic Church in Uganda.””

 

Let me check that time line. February to March 21^st 2023 was the whole brouhaha in the country. The Catholic Bishops were silent…
The Bill was sent to the President. The President sent it back with comments two months later. The bill was revised and sent back to the President. The President signed it.

Ahem, the bill became an Act, without the powerful Catholic Church’s input? 5 good months of this year, 2023 of our lord in silence?
Hypocrisy…, dear Holy Fathers. But that would be lying hypocrisy, isn’t it?

I noted it.

But, some more influential and much more knowledgeable people have also noted the glaring, deafening silence, over the last 5 months. The Catholic Church in Uganda has been Deaf. Dumb. and Blind.

How powerful is the Catholic Church in Uganda?
Oh, it actually is very, very powerful. And, it is Catholic faithful that have been at the helm of passing the Anti-Homosexuality Act, 2023. Speaker Anita Among, and MP Charles Ochen, a former Catholic priest was one of the movers on the bill at first reading…
But, how really powerful is the powerful Catholic Church in Uganda? Someone pointedly points that out.

 

“the Catholic Church’s influential role in Uganda, with nearly 40% of Ugandans identifying as Catholic. Catholic bishops, considered moral leaders by millions, hold a unique position of influence and could potentially shift the narrative around this inhumane legislation. . .”

 

And, another nexus of power, were the Catholic Bishops to come out against the Anti-Homosexuality Act, they would have the reigning Pontiff at their back. Pope Francis is solidly against the criminalisation of sexuality. He has said so, repeatedly. Last time as recently as February 2023 on a trip to DRC and South Sudan.
And, for reasons that I fail to understand, Pope Francis has sway with the populace in Uganda, the lay Catholics. At least that is my poor observation. But, I am not a believer, and I am not a Catholic, so I might be really mistaken.

And, Why the F*** would the Catholic Church come out against the Anti-Homosexuality Act 2023?
Because it is against their teaching in quite a number of things. The Death Penalty. Criminalising behaviour that they see as just sin. Teaching to nurture and not to punish…., apparently it is spelt out in the Catechism or something like that.

 

“The Catechism of the Catholic Church denounces both the death penalty (n. 2306) and “unjust discrimination” against people with lesbian and gay people (n.2358).”

 

That is the kind of page and verse that I wouldn’t be able to quote.
Now, with an institution as centralised as the Catholic Church, having the Pope and the Church’s teaching in my corner would mean that I am on solid ground..,

But, in reading around, I have come to understand the apparent constraints on the power of the Pope. He has some powerful enemies. Particularly in the US. Conservatives, they are apparently called. So, the pressure on the Catholic Bishops in Uganda is not clear cut, nor is it going to bring a powerful sermon from Rubaga Cathedral, wonder of wonders, condemning the Anti-Homosexuality Act, 2023.
But, it is intriguing, that Catholic Dogma and the Pontiff are on this side of the question.

It is even interesting that an American Catholic Bishop (anti-Biden.., and Conservative apparently, Americans are really weird…) took a swipe at President Biden, but wouldn’t go as far as going against Catholic doctrine.

 

“the Church’s teaching against the death penalty is clear. The Church also clearly teaches that, while homosexual acts are gravely sinful, homosexual people must be ‘accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity’ and that ‘Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided.'””

 

So, even Uganda’s Catholic Bishops conservative pals in America have a line beyond which Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Act 2023 has strayed?!

Very interesting.
But, ultimately, the Catholic Bishops of Uganda unreservedly support the Anti-Homosexuality Act, 2023. They are not going to come out and challenge it. Not at all. The silence serves their purpose. They are as homophobic as most Ugandans and to hell with the Catechism’s specific teaching. (Hey, why shouldn’t I also indulge my honest anger a little bit? Just a tiny little bit, like calling out their hypocrisy!)That is the language they understand and I am unamused enough to tell truth unadorned.

Without parsing language at all, this quote below is the essence of what the Catholic Bishops of Uganda believe about homosexuality. This was not a slip of the tongue, a problem with language. This was a reflection of what most if not all Ugandans believe is the Uganda Catholic Church’s position on homosexuality.  This is the truth, unadorned.

 

“Bishop Sanctus Lino Wanok of Lira, Uganda, called homosexuality “not human” in an Ash Wednesday homily”

 

How would that square with the Catholic Church Catechism…, this unbeliever wonders.
Yeah, we do have great examples of ‘Un-Christ-like Christians’.

 

gug

The Hypocrisy of Uganda’s Catholic Church’s Silence and Non-Action

 

Been thinking about this for some time. A columnist in the Monitor newspaper commented that the Catholic Church in Uganda was manifesting wisdom in not contributing to the ‘debate on homosexuality’ in the country. The ‘debate’ is rather one sided, and is more of a diatribe on the evil of homosexuality…, my sexual orientation. Is the Catholic Church in Uganda’s silence one of wisdom? Maybe. And maybe not.

I have compared their silence to playing deaf, dumb and blind. I have also compared them to Pope Pius the XII (so called the Nazi Pope, or Hitler’s Pope). And no, am not shy about calling them out. Hypocrites; the silence serves their purpose well.

Reminds me of one of the Nazarene’s teaching parables.
A traveller was ambushed on the road by robbers. They beat and left him for dead. Other travellers passed the robbers’ victim on the side of the road. They noticed him, but left him…, for some very logical reasons. Maybe the Levite didn’t want to be ‘polluted’, and maybe one of the others was hurrying to a wedding…, whatever. Till the ‘Good Samaritan’ stopped and helped the victim of robbery…, silence prevailed.

Cogent reasons not to speak out and act. Very logical and good, maybe.

The country is on fire, ready to lynch the homosexuals. Would the very powerful Catholic Church please stand up and say something? Well, the Moslems have had their say. The Anglicans have had their say. The Pentecostals have also had their say. What of the Catholics? Are they leaving everything to the politicians? It is supposedly a ‘moral’ debate.

Why is the Catholic Church in Uganda silent?
Have they released a statement? They were waiting for the ‘entire bill’. Still on its way to Rubaga?
I must have been asleep. I didn’t hear…! Or they are yet to say anything?

Maybe the reasons are political. The Pontiff, Pope Francis, has not been silent. Homosexuality is a sin. He is definite. And, criminalising it is not okay. Unequivocal, and vocal, repeatedly. How can the Catholic Church in Uganda go against the Pontiff when he has made his mind known? Bad politics, at the very least.

What if the Pontiff is wrong? These are sinners, the homosexuals. Isn’t the mighty Catholic Church of a mind to reserve them for hell on earth, life in prison, and Death? Or are they against the death penalty? [In principle, as the head of the Church of Uganda hurries to admit. In principle, reality is different.]

Could it be that the mighty Catholic Church in Uganda dare not admit that these are sinners, just like the ones Christ used to associate with?

Or, is it that the popularity of rabid condemnation of the minority homosexuals in Uganda is not good to go against, for the moral power and popularity of the Church, Christ’s Church? One needs to remind ones’ self that it does matter, popularity. It takes guts to champion homosexuals in Uganda in anyway… That is brutal matter of fact.

Or could it be that the homosexuals are such bad sinners that no hand need be lifted to help or aid them in their plight.
Leave them to die on the side of the road, I would judge. Good riddance, to bad evil. Why waste time, energy, prestige and even thinking about them?

Yes, I am strongly reminded of the stance of Pope Pious XII.
He was strangely silent through the Holocaust of the Third Reich. So much that he was branded ‘Hitler’s Pope’, and a silent Nazi sympathiser to the genocide of Jews. And, yes, those with the pink triangles were homosexuals. Gassed in gas chambers by Hitler too, they haven’t improved in the popularity context since, apparently!

Oh, I am certain that the mighty and powerful Catholic Church in Uganda is silent because they totally agree and support Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Act, 2023.
That is why I am poking at them…, it is good fun!

 

gug