World Bank to implement LGBTQ safeguards before resuming new Uganda funding

The World Bank will aim to ensure gay and transgender Ugandans are not discriminated against in its programmes before resuming new funding, which was halted in August over an anti-LGBTQ law, a bank executive said.

Ashley Karungi 33, a member of the LGBTQ community at the offices of Rella Women's Empowerment Program, for LGBTQ rights advocacy, after a Reuters interview in Kulambiro suburb of Kampala, Uganda April 4, 2023. REUTERS - ABUBAKER LUBOWA

World Bank project documents will make it clear that LGBTQ+ Ugandans should not face discrimination and that staff will not be arrested for including them, Victoria Kwakwa, the bank's head for eastern and southern Africa, told Reuters news agency.

Rights groups have said that the Anti-Homosexuality Act (AHA), which was enacted in May and prescribes the death penalty for certain same-sex acts, has unleashed a torrent of abuse against LGBTQ+ people, mostly by private individuals.

"We're doing all this to clarify this is not what you should be doing in World Bank-financed projects and to say you are allowed to do it the right way and you will be not be arrested," Kwakwa said, on the sidelines of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund's annual meetings in Marrakech, Morocco.

She declined to give a timeline for assessing the measures' efficacy and moving to a decision on whether to resume new funding for Uganda.

"We have discussed this at length with government. Government is comfortable with that," Kwakwa said.

• Uganda's president signs harsh anti-gay bill into law
• Archbishop of Canterbury decries Ugandan church support for severe anti-gay legislation

When the World Bank suspended new funding on 8 August, Ugandan officials accused the development finance institution of hypocrisy, saying it was lending to countries in the Middle East and Asia that have the same or harsher laws targeting LGBTQ+ people.

The government would need to revise its budget to reflect the suspension's potential financial impact, a junior finance minister said at the time.

The World Bank's portfolio of projects in Uganda was $5.2 billion at the end of 2022. These have not been affected by the decision to suspend new financing.

(with Reuters)