Anti-gay law puts Uganda tourism at risk.
Africa - Mail & Guardian,1 hour ago
Uganda could suffer a backlash from tour operators in the West angered
by President Yoweri Museveni's new law against homosexuality.
Uganda had one high- profile visitor this week, and the country's
tourism board talked up his arrival.
"Everybody knows Forest Whitaker is in Uganda," the board's deputy
chief executive, John Ssempebwa, told the Mail & Guardian after the
Oscar-winning actor flew into the country on the night of March 10.
Whitaker, together with National Football League players from the
United States, is doing charity work in northern Uganda, donating
hearing equipment to people affected by the war there against the
Lord's Resistance Army.
Having filmed The Last King of Scotland in Uganda, in which he
portrayed late dictator Idi Amin, Whitaker, who was apparently not
doing any press interviews this time around, is already a fan of the
country.
But the "pearl of Africa", as Churchill famously dubbed the East
African nation after a visit circa 1900, a moniker used by numerous
Ugandan restaurants, hotels and travel companies, now needs as many
tourists, particularly celebrities, as it can get after its president
signed a harsh anti-gay Bill into law on February 24.
Read: Sovereignty has fallen to the prejudices of outsiders
Uganda was named Lonely Planet's number one place to visit in 2012, a
much-needed boost for the country after years of negative press thanks
to its dictators and warlords.
But this week, there was much talk in Kampala of cancellations and a
potentially damaging backlash from tourists and travel companies after
President Yoweri Museveni signed the Anti-Homosexuality Bill, 2014,
into law.
People were reluctant to speak on the record, but one safari operator
based in the capital, which focuses on luxury international trips,
said that she had received a frosty email response from a US-based
outbound safari company after requesting a meeting at the Tourism
Indaba due to be held in Durban in May.
"A safari operator based in the US has advised us that it will not let
Uganda receive a cent of the millions of dollars the firm sends to
Africa each year until the legislation is revoked, and suggests we
complain to the government about how it is hurting our business," she
said.
The owner of a Kampala-based travel company targeting the US and
Canada said it was inevitable some tourists would stay away.
Discreet lodges
"The Americans who are part of the anti-gay movement will come, many
of them as volunteers," he said. "Do we get gay visitors? Yes. Do we
ask if they are gay? No. Most lodges are owned by Westerners and are
discreet. Unlike Nigeria, we have had no rounding up of people, [but]
one does not know what tomorrow will bring."
Just a day after Museveni signed the Bill, Wild Rainbow African
Safaris, a California-based company specialising in guided safaris to
East and Southern Africa and targeting the lesbian, gay, bisexual,
transgender and intersex (LGBTI) community, scrapped its Uganda great
apes safari, which was planned for June.
"This Bill is an affront to human rights, as well as to the respect
and dignity of LGBTI Ugandans and their allies," owner Jody Cole told
Oblogdee, a blog authored by international human rights advocate
Melanie Nathan.
But, according to the Uganda Tourism Board, there have been "no
cancellations", and tourists shouldn't be concerned about the new law.
"The ban [on homosexual acts] has no impact whatsoever. And it
shouldn't, because no one will arrest tourists visiting Uganda,"
Ssempeba said, despite the fact that the penalties set out in the
Anti-Homosexuality Act, 2014, could be applied to visitors.
Imprisonment for life
In a March 3 statement, the board said that the law did "not seek to
sentence or kill homosexuals". But the Act does state that a person
who commits "the offence of homosexuality" or "aggravated
homosexuality" will be liable on conviction to imprisonment for life.
"The government has the mandate to observe the majority interests,
convictions and beliefs of its people, which is democratic practice
and, consequently, reaffirms that Uganda is indeed a democratic
nation," the board said.
The nation received more than 1.1-million international tourists in
2012, the board said, pointing out that the country was among 34 out
of 54 African countries where same-sex marriage was a crime.
According to an August 2013 report by independent travel and tourism
news website eTurboNews, which quoted a World Bank report, Uganda's
tourism earnings in 2012 were just more than $1-billion, and made up
more than 5.5% of the country's gross domestic product.
But more than dollars is at stake if a travel boycott proves
effective, as the president of US-based African Travel Inc, which has
specialised in personalised safaris to East and Southern Africa for
the past 38 years, pointed out.
American culture
"Think of the Americans who visit Uganda, providing an insight into
American culture for the Ugandans, and, similarly, think of how
Ugandans, with their apparent lack of material trappings but simple
dignity, inspire and humble American visitors from the so-called
developed world, forcing them to rethink their values," said Jim
Holden.
He is not the only one who stresses the importance of exposure. The
travel of Uganda's leader and legislators who backed the Bill is now
also under discussion.
Scottish cycling legend Graeme Obree is behind a petition calling for
Ugandan politicians who supported the legislation to be barred from
attending the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, starting in July.
But activist Geoffrey Ogwaro, the assistant co-ordinator of the Civil
Society Coalition on Human Rights and Constitutional Law, formed in
response to the tabling of the Bill in 2009, wondered whether
restricting the travel of politicians, at least in Museveni's case,
would help.
"I think [that] it's good if he travels to these other venues and gets
to meet people, so that they can challenge him from there," Ogwaro
said.
"If he stays here, then he gets cocooned, he festers because of what
is happening. It makes him more vengeful and full of hate."
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