Gay asylum seekers in danger if sent home-Uganda

Laws outlawing same-sex relations exist in 31 out of 54 African countries, according to the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association (ILGA).

Gay sex can be punishable by death in northern Nigeria, Sudan, Somalia and Mauritania.

Same-sex liaisons are illegal in Uganda. People convicted of homosexuality can be sent to jail for the rest of their lives.

However, Angola, Mozambique and the Seychelles have all scrapped anti-homosexuality laws in recent years.

The chaplain at Rodney’s college put him in touch with the Citizen’s Advice Bureau, which told him about the asylum process.

Rodney was interviewed and asked about his relationships. He told them that he had never been in a serious one. His application for asylum was turned down. He says he was told it was because he was not in a same-sex relationship, and his nature was quiet rather than flamboyant.

“Basically they were saying I was not outgoing or camp enough. That I could go back and behave in a discreet manner.

“I had been hiding for a lifetime, I came to a country where I can go out and be myself. Now I’m just waiting to see if I really have to go back and hide again.”

In 2002, after being discovered in a same-sex act, 18-year-old Godfrey went on the run with a friend. Armed men found them and attacked them. Godfrey hid in the latrine, and stayed there as he saw his companion tortured and murdered.

“They came with guns and surrounded the house. They grabbed the shotgun and shot him in the side of the head when he was kneeling down. I thought they were coming to the latrine to take me.

“What is next for me? I am so scared, the police are looking for me and I’ve already committed the gay sex,” he said.

Godfrey and his friend had already fled the capital, Kampala, and were in the rebel-held territories of northern Uganda. He was unpopular with the authorities, he says, not just because he was gay, but because he’d spoken out against the president, Yoweri Museveni.

“I was dismissed from school. When I was dismissed from school I was rejected by my family. My father said ‘there is no way I can keep you here, because already the school has informed the police'”.

After his friend was murdered, Godfrey managed to get to Kenya and from there he was smuggled to England.

Nine years later he applied for political asylum. He was refused.

He then applied on the grounds of his sexual orientation. Again, he was refused. He has appealed and is waiting for the Home Office’s decision.

Godfrey said the screening and interviews involved in the process made him anxious because he felt his questioners did not believe he was gay.

“There’s no way I can prove it,” he said.

“I mean, do you want me to find a man and kiss him? Would that do it?”

Yudaya has been studying in the UK since 2018. She was not openly gay back home but she did have a girlfriend, who is still in Uganda.

Her family recently found out she is a lesbian.

“My big sister called me. She said the police came, and to please not contact my family again.

“She said: ‘We asked why the police were looking for you and they explained you are a lesbian. You are with people spreading homosexuality around.'”

Yudaya said the Home Office, although it accepted she was gay, was not convinced she would be in danger if she had to go back to Uganda.

“To them, if I lived my life quietly, if I concealed my sexuality before, then it’s possible i can go back and live in another area [of the country] and conceal my sexuality again, but I don’t think that’s the case any more”.