Drug user communities speak out on the proposed Uganda sexual offences bill

On Monday, 3rd May 2021, the Parliament of Uganda enacted the Sexual Offences Act, 2021, which is now awaiting presidential assent. The Bill was first presented as the Sexual Offences Bill, 2015, published in the Uganda Gazette on 11th December 2015.1 It was tabled in Parliament on 14th April 2016 as a Private Member’s Bill by National Female Youth MP, Monica Amoding under the umbrella of the Uganda Women’s Parliamentary Association (UWOPA).

On behalf of the community of people who use drugs in diversity, Uganda Harm Reduction Network would like express the shared and profound concern at the continued enforcement of discriminatory, stigmatizing, criminalizing and harmful laws which abet bad policies and practices that increase vulnerability to HIV and continue to criminalise the already marginalised population. This proposed bill is yet another step backward in the fight against the HIV AIDS because it is founded on stigma and discrimination and based on approaches that have been condemned by international health agencies as ineffective and violating the rights of people who use drugs living and affected with HIV including; sex workers and sexual and gender minorities.