Frank Mugisha (born 17 June 1979) is a Ugandan

LGBT ' is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an umbrella term for sexuality and gender identity. The LGBT term is a ...

advocate and Executive Director of

Sexual Minorities Uganda Sexual Minorities Uganda (SMUG) is an umbrella non-governmental organization based in Kampala, Uganda. In August 2022 SMUG was ordered by the Ugandan government to immediately shut down. Organisation Founders included Victor Mukasa and Sy ...

(SMUG), who has won the

Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award The Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award, was created by the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial in 1984, now known as the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights to honour individuals around the world who have shown great courage and have made a significant contr ...

and

Thorolf Rafto Memorial Prize The Professor Thorolf Rafto Memorial Prize (''Raftoprisen'') is a human rights award established in the memory of the Norwegian human rights activist, Thorolf Rafto. Organization The prize is awarded annually by the Rafto Foundation for Human Righ ...

2011 for his activism. Mugisha is one of the most prominent advocates for

LGBT rights in Uganda Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) persons in Uganda face legal challenges, active discrimination and stigmatisation not experienced by non-LGBT residents. Both male and female homosexual activity are illegal in Uganda. Under the Pen ...

Biography

Mugisha was born in a suburb of

Kampala Kampala (, ) is the capital and largest city of Uganda. The city proper has a population of 1,680,000 and is divided into the five political divisions of Kampala Central Division, Kawempe Division, Makindye Division, Nakawa Division, and Ruba ...

Uganda }), is a landlocked country in East Africa East Africa, Eastern Africa, or East of Africa, is the eastern subregion of the African continent. In the United Nations Statistics Division scheme of geographic regions, 10-11-(16*) territor ...

. Raised in a strict Catholic family, he came out to his brother at age 14. Although his coming out estranged him from some family members, other friends and family have continued to support him. While still at university in 2004, he founded Icebreakers Uganda, an organization created as a support network for LGBT Ugandans who are out or in the process of coming out to family and friends. Mugisha is now the executive director of SMUG, an umbrella organization that consists of eighteen groups, including Icebreakers Uganda. Mugisha has been honored by the UN - Secretary General. Listed in the Advocate Magazine, The Independent, honored by Black Entertainment Television - BET and Mugisha was named by #POWER10: among most Influential Black LGBTQ people in 2014. Mugisha was close friends with fellow advocate and SMUG founder

David Kato David Kato Kisule ( – 26 January 2011) was a Ugandan teacher and LGBT rights activist, considered a father of Uganda's gay rights movement and described as "Uganda's first openly gay man". He served as advocacy officer for Sexual Minorities ...

, who was murdered in January 2011 after successfully suing a tabloid named ''

Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first kno ...

'' for publishing the names of 100 LGBT Ugandans with an encouragement to "hang them". Mugisha is one of the plaintiffs from SMUG represented by the

Center for Constitutional Rights The Center for Constitutional RightsThe Center for Constitutional Rights
(CCR) is a Alien Tort Statute The Alien Tort Statute ( codified in 1948 as ; ATS), also called the Alien Tort Claims Act (ATCA), is a section in the United States Code that gives federal courts jurisdiction over lawsuits filed by foreign nationals for torts committed in viola ...

to sue American evangelist

Scott Lively Scott Douglas Lively (born December 14, 1957) is an American activist, author, and attorney, who is the president of Abiding Truth Ministries, an anti-LGBT group based in Temecula, California. He was also a cofounder of Latvia-based group Watchm ...

for

crimes against humanity Crimes against humanity are widespread or systemic acts committed by or on behalf of a ''de facto'' authority, usually a state, that grossly violate human rights. Unlike war crimes, crimes against humanity do not have to take place within the ...

for his work on the Uganda's Anti-Homosexuality Bill, work described as inciting the persecution of gay men and lesbians and as "conduct ... actively trying to harm and deprive other people of their rights

hich Ij ( fa, ايج, also Romanized as Īj; also known as Hich and Īch) is a village in Golabar Rural District, in the Central District of Ijrud County, Zanjan Province, Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also ...

is the definition of persecution". In August 2013, Federal

U.S. District Court The United States district courts are the trial courts of the U.S. federal judiciary. There is one district court for each federal judicial district, which each cover one U.S. state or, in some cases, a portion of a state. Each district cou ...

Judge Michael A. Ponsor ruled that the plaintiffs were on solid ground under international and federal law in rejecting a jurisdictional challenge to the suit; he also ruled that First Amendment defenses for Lively's conduct were premature. Writing in ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' in 2014, Mugisha argued that homophobia and the hatred behind the Anti-Homosexuality Bill were from western influences: "I am a gay man. I am also Ugandan. There is nothing un-African about me. Uganda is where I was born, grew up and call my home. It is also a country in which I have become little more than an unapprehended criminal because of whom I love. I want my fellow Ugandans to understand that homosexuality is not a western import and our friends in the developed world to recognise that the current trend of homophobia is."

Recognition

Mugisha was awarded the 2011

and the 2011

Rafto Prize The Professor Thorolf Rafto Memorial Prize (''Raftoprisen'') is a human rights award established in the memory of the Norwegian human rights activist, Thorolf Rafto. Organization The prize is awarded annually by the Rafto Foundation for Human Righ ...

for his work pursuing LGBT rights in Uganda. He also received an honorary doctorate of the

University of Ghent Ghent University ( nl, Universiteit Gent, abbreviated as UGent) is a public research university located in Ghent, Belgium. Established before the state of Belgium itself, the university was founded by the Dutch King William I in 1817, when the ...

. Mugisha was a 2014 nominee for the

Nobel Peace Prize The Nobel Peace Prize is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the will of Swedish industrialist, inventor and armaments (military weapons and equipment) manufacturer Alfred Nobel, along with the prizes in Nobel Prize in Chemistry, Chemi ...

. In 2017, Mugisha was included in ''

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s list of world's greatest leaders.

References

External links

SMUG official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mugisha, Frank 1979 births Living people Ugandan LGBT rights activists Ugandan gay men People from Kampala Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award laureates 21st-century Ugandan LGBT people

Biography

Recognition

See also

References

External links