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Integrity and Ethics minister, Nsaba Buturo, was at it again last week, accusing the United Nations of promoting homosexuality.
I
would have dismissed the claim as his latest attempt to grab the
headlines, were it not for a related incident a few days earlier.
While
hanging around the United Nations in New York, where I happen to have a
few friends, I was approached by a white American woman, perhaps in her
40s.
She introduced herself and a young African boy, whom she
described as her Mozambican son. She asked whether I was a government
representative. I told her that I am small fish who was just checking
on some friends.
“And would those friends be government representatives?” she asked.
“Sure. I have a couple of friends who work for the Ugandan mission to the United Nations,” I told her. “You
are from Uganda?” she said excitedly. “I know your First Lady Janet
Museveni. She gave a keynote speech at our conference. Do you know
Martin Ssempa? He is our regional coordinator [in Africa],” she said.
Having
thus established her Ugandan credentials, she asked me to introduce her
to my friends, as she had a burning issue to discuss with them. “Some
countries are trying to smuggle provisions on homosexuality into an
important UN resolution,” she explained. “Many government
representatives don’t have the time to read all the documents and they
may pass it without realising the gravity of their actions.” She
was, therefore, looking for government representatives, especially from
Africa, to block the resolution. She passed me some documents
containing the offending provisions.
When she left, I looked at the
document, wondering what it was the United Nations was trying to do
about homosexuals. Surely it couldn’t be that the United Nations was
trying to get homosexuals around the world locked up? It turns
out that the said provisions were about HIV/AIDS. They were calling
upon countries to ensure access to reproductive and HIV/AIDS health
services to all their citizens, including homosexuals.
So Nsaba
Butoro is right after all. Some nasty people at the United Nations are
trying to protect homosexuals from HIV/AIDS! How reprehensible! How
can our Godly nation, with a matching motto to boot (For God and My
Country), be part of such an evil plot? Homosexuals must die of
HIV/AIDS, unlike heterosexuals who must surely have drunk HIV/AIDS in
their coffee. Our country did not become a model in the fight
against HIV/AIDS by pandering to the “abnormal” and “unnatural”
practices of homosexuality (Buturo’s words, not mine). On the contrary,
a senior United Nations official who tried to have the protection of
homosexuals from HIV/AIDS integrated into the national AIDS programme
was kicked out of town, reportedly on the orders of the First Lady. In
this God-loving country, homosexuals must pay their taxes, die of AIDS,
and rot in hell. All power to our holy trinity of ministers - Nsaba
Buturo, Janet Museveni and, in a religious sense, Martin Ssempa. God
must be very pleased with them. wang@observer.ug
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