Free Republic

Ugandan lawmakers have passed a new version of an anti-gay bill that removes penalties for those who identify as LGBTQ. The country’s national assembly previously passed a sweeping bill criminalizing those who identify as LGBTQ, engage in homosexual acts, disseminate information about homosexuality, or advocate on behalf of LGBTQ causes. But Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni sent the bill back, demanding changes to the bill. Among those changes were a distinction between those who identify as LGBTQ and those who advocate on behalf of LGBTQ rights or present homosexuality as an acceptable lifestyle. Another change suggested by Museveni was clemency for...

Uganda has announced that it has struck a deposit of 31 million tonnes of gold ore, with extractable pure gold estimated to gross 320,000 tonnes.President Museveni broke news of the find in his State-of-the-Nation Address yesterday, but provided little detail, pointing in general that it would fetch the country more than $12 trillion.Technocrats in the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Development, Mr Museveni noted, had informed Cabinet that the country was positioned to get slightly under $700m in royalty payments, with the investors poised to cash in on the windfall.Citing six local gold refineries, among them Africa Gold Refinery in...

Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni has scored a decisive election victory to win a sixth term, the country’s election commission said on Saturday, but his main rival Bobi Wine denounced the results as fraudulent and urged citizens to reject them. The 76-year-old Museveni, in power since 1986 and one of Africa’s longest-serving leaders, dismissed the allegations of fraud in an evening address to the nation, saying Thursday’s election may turn out to be the “most cheating free” in Uganda’s history. The Electoral Commission said final counts showed Museveni won 5.85 million votes, or 58.6%, while Wine had 3.48 million votes (34.8%)....

Ethiopia, Sunday -- Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni has urged African leaders to stop “ideological meandering”. Leaders, he said, should thoroughly discuss and distill positions which can help their people transform and develop using their natural resources. Museveni added that focus should be on home-based solutions and self-reliance. He said new US President Donald Trump’s “America First” policies will jolt Africans into the reality of their situation. “I love Trump. I love that man Trump because that man has told you that he is not your uncle. And I think it is good. For those Africans who feel orphaned, am sorry...

President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda gave a state banquet late Thursday in honor of North Korea’s ceremonial head of state, praising Pyongyang for what he said was its prominent role in fighting imperialism. Kim Yong Nam, the president of the country’s parliament, is in Uganda as part of a rare tour of Africa, where North Korea has actively tried to cultivate potential allies like the long-serving, increasingly anti-West Museveni. The North Koreans are training Ugandan police in martial arts and Museveni hailed North Korea for helping to mechanize Uganda’s military over the years. North Korea is also training Ugandan military...

An army of child tyrants is terrorising nothern Uganda FIRST the rebels tied Geofrey Obita’s hands behind his back so tightly that he could barely move his fingers. Then, telling the 16-year-old schoolboy not to scream, they sliced off his ears. Then they pushed him down to the ground and cut off what they could of his lips. “They were all over me, stamping, pushing, cutting. I could not move, I could barely breathe,” he told The Times in a barely audible whisper from his hospital bed in the small impoverished northern Ugandan town of Kitgum. Yet the child soldiers...

“Maybe we can reach a point of reconsideration” on Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Bill, Kerry said during a forum at the State Department. The Ugandan president committed to meeting with American “experts” on homosexuality to try to change his mind about the Anti-Homosexuality Act signed into law last month, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Tuesday during a forum at the State Department moderated by BuzzFeed. Museveni claimed to have signed the law, which imposes up to a lifetime prison sentence for homosexuality, after being convinced no one is “born gay.” “I talked personally to President Museveni just a few...

Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni said on Friday he would sign a controversial anti-gay bill into law, warning that those who promoted homosexuality would be dealt with harshly. Museveni last month indicated he was planning to shelve the bill, which has attracted fierce criticism from Western donors and human rights groups since its inception in 2009. Homosexuality is taboo in African countries and illegal in 37. Activists say few Africans are openly gay, fearing imprisonment, violence and loss of their jobs. During a conference held by Uganda’s ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) party, a group of scientists presented their findings on...

President Yoweri Museveni has repented his sins and the sins of Uganda as a nation in a move aimed at establishing Uganda as a God-fearing nation. The President made this historic move at Mandela National stadium Namboole in the early morning of today (Tuesday) at 2:00am during national prayers for dedicating Uganda to God. "I denounce witchcraft and satanic practices. I repent on behalf of Uganda. We confess our sins. We repent of the sins of shedding innocent blood, corruption, bribery, sexual immorality, drunkenness, rebellion, insubordination, tribalism and sectarianism," Museveni repented amidst ululations from the Christians. The president dedicated Uganda...

This morning President Bush urged Congress to pass the Appropriations billsAlso, this President Bush met with President Museveni of Uganda in the Oval OfficePresident Bush also nominated Dr. James Peake as Secretary of Veterans AffairsU.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates (R) welcomed Italy's Defense Minister Arturo Parisi to the Pentagon for a meeting in Arlington, Virginia Enoy your visit to Sanity Island

KAMPALA (Reuters) - Uganda's First Family was celebrating a joint political triumph on Sunday as Janet Museveni capped her husband's re-election as president by seizing a parliament seat from one of his biggest rivals. President Yoweri Museveni, 62, extended his two-decade rule at an election on Thursday that saw him trounce his former doctor and main challenger Kizza Besigye. In a double blow to Besigye's opposition Forum for Democratic Change (FDC), Janet also swept away one of its most senior officials in her bid to become a member of parliament. Most famous for her support for abstinence programmes to fight...

KAMPALA, Uganda, Nov. 29 (UPI) -- Critics say the president of Uganda, who plans to run his wife for parliament, is becoming a dictator in the style of Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe. Janet Museveni will challenge Augustine Ruzindana, a former ally of President Yoweri Museveni who is now a key opposition leader, the Times of London reported. "For the past three years we have been witnessing the creation of a Museveni dynasty," Ruzindana said. "He can't trust anyone but family -- which is why he has them in all the different state institutions." Kizza Besigye, head of the Forum for Democratic...

Uganda's former President, Milton Obote, has died at the age of 81 in hospital in South Africa. Mr Obote led Uganda to independence as prime minister in 1962, going on to serve two terms as president - both of which ended in military coups. Overthrown by Idi Amin in 1971, he returned to office in 1980, only to be ousted in 1985 by forces led by Yoweri Museveni, Uganda's current president. Mr Obote had spent most of the last 20 years in exile in Zambia.

President Yoweri Museveni said in a statement that Uganda must become financially independent of donor nations that provide about half its budget but which he said are partly to blame for many if its problems. Museveni has often hit out at donors for giving "unsolicited" advice, and says that by exporting their bountiful raw materials for processing in the West, African nations are the real donors. "The raw materials that we have been donating to the Western countries must be turned into final products," he said in the statement, saying there were international markets for Ugandan coffee, cotton, cereals, beef,...

Former colonial power Britain is one of the biggest donors among nations that contributed almost $850 million to government coffers in 2003-2004, about 48 percent of Uganda's budget. Since 1987, rich nations have bankrolled Uganda's economic recovery, which has been based on stability, market liberalisation and improved security in a country haunted by bloody memories of the late Idi Amin's dictatorship. Uganda's economy has grown by about 6 percent a year for more than a decade. British budget support is linked to reforms, officials say, including setting up rules for multiparty competition and separating state organs from Museveni's "no-party" Movement...

Suspected dissidents disappear after midnight visits to their homes; chilling screams can again be heard from Idi Amin's infamous torture chambers, reopened after a quarter of a century of disuse. From the few that escape come tales of punishment beatings and even mass executions. Welcome to President Yoweri Museveni's Uganda. One of Britain's favourite African states in recent years has, almost unnoticed in the West, become a sinister land where a corrupt regime uses its secret police to rule through fear. The reasons for this transition are not hard to fathom. Mr Museveni has ruled Uganda since 1986, when his...

This is a link to the 26 page PDF Document, a bit too long to post completely. Excerpt: HIV/AIDS is the biggest challenge to mankind in the 21 st century only comparable to the Bubonic plague of the middle ages. In order to avert more deaths and suffering from this insidious viral infection leaders of nations must stand resolute with total commitment to lead the fight and galvanize the entire efforts of communities and nations to face the challenge. Although a global problem, more than 90% of HIV infections occur in developing countries like Uganda. The morbidity and mortality figures...

Kidnap me, says Uganda leader Children are often abducted by the LRA President Yoweri Museveni has dared Uganda's rebels to abduct him rather than civilians after he moved to the central town of Soroti to direct the army campaign. He was speaking after the army accused the Lord's Resistance Army of killing 13 children whom they had abducted. However, the LRA staged an ambush 30km from Soroti a day after Mr Museveni's arrival on Saturday, killing five people and abducting 10 more. The LRA has been fighting since the late 1980s to replace President Yoweri Museveni's secular government in a...

The US First Lady, Laura Bush, had tears in her eyes yesterday as she listened to a performance by the Watoto children's choir - made up mainly of children orphaned by HIV/Aids. Laura, and her husband, US President George W. Bush, were at The Aids Support Organisation clinic in Entebbe on the last stop of their four-hour visit to Uganda. During the emotional presentation, where President Yoweri Museveni was also present, Ms Bush wiped tears from her eyes as the children sang Christian songs of hope in English. Later, President Bush promised more support to Uganda in the fight...