Pressure continues to mount on Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni not to assent to the Anti-homosexuality Bill with the latest protagonists citing economic implications.
Open For Business, a global business coalition has written to the President through its chair Jon Miller saying the Bill will undermine Uganda’s attractiveness for business and investors.
"Businesses operating in Uganda want to see a thriving Ugandan economy. However, the Anti-Homosexuality Bill (AHB) will make it harder for Uganda to foster a dynamic and diversified modern economy that is attractive to investors, tourists and skilled workers," Miller said.
Uganda's Parliament overwhelmingly voted to pass the Bill on March 21 with only one of the 389 MPs who attended the debate objecting to its enactment.
The bill prescribes the death penalty for aggravated homosexuality or forcing children, the disabled, mentally ill persons and those of advanced age into homosexuality.
Attempted homosexuality will attract a 14-year jail term and up to 20 years for promotion of homosexuality. Recruiters of children into homosexuality will be slapped with a ten-year jail sentence.
The Bill will become law if Museveni signs it as is highly expected.
"I respectfully ask you to consider refusing to provide assent to the Bill to serve the national interest of Uganda," Miller told Museveni in the letter.
Open For Business is a business coalition comprising 37 multinational business enterprises including Google, Unilever, Microsoft, L'Oreal, MasterCard, KPMG, Deloitte, IBM, Meta, Standard Chartered and LinkedIn.
Miller said there is a strong economic rationale for better inclusion of the LGBTQ community in Uganda's economic matrix since discrimination has a detrimental effect on employees and runs counter to the interests of businesses.
"The evidence shows that policies designed to exclude minorities such as the LGBTQ+ community have a real cost –not only on people but on business performance as well as national economic competitiveness," he said.
Miller argued that if enacted, the Bill will also make it a crime to pursue policies of diversity and inclusion in Uganda by making it illegal to provide information and support to LGBTQ+ employees.
"Further, it will compel companies to report those perceived to be LGBTQ+ to the authorities. This contravenes international standards of corporate responsibility and best business practice," he said.
The voice adds to pressure from gay rights activists who a week ago condemned Ugandan MPs for voting to criminalise anyone who engages in same-sex activities or publicly identifies as a member of the LGBTQ+ community.
They have termed the provision 'promotion of homosexuality' as vague saying it will encourage homophobia and discourage human rights activists from operating in Uganda.
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk said on March 22 that adoption of the draconian law is shocking and devastating.
“The bill confuses consensual and non-consensual relations. The former should never be criminalised, whereas the latter requires evidence-based measures to end sexual violence in all its forms," he said.
Türk further argued that the new law exposes journalists, medical workers and human rights defenders to lengthy prison terms for simply doing their work.