Campaign aims to stop deportation of lesbian landlady who would face ‘certain danger’ to Uganda
A campaign has been started to stop the deportation of a Ugandan lesbian who has been “violently persecuted” for being gay, and for renting property to gay tenants, from the UK.
The Save Anne campaign, aims to stop the 9 April deportation of Anne back to Uganda. She is currently being detained at Yarl’s Wood Immigration Removal Centre.
She says gay tenants in her properties have already been killed, and that the houses were destroyed.
Those involved have started a petition to stop the deportation with a petition, Facebook campaign and website.
Anne’s case is unique, according to campaign organisers, because she was targeted not only for being gay herself, but because she rented properties to gay tenants.
The campaign calls on the Home Secretary to lobby the Home Office to immediately cancel the order for Anne to be deported.
Noting the recently introduced anti-gay legislation in the country, Anne says she would be attacked by those in her village, including her family, if she were to return there.
In a telephone conversation with the campaign, published on saveanne.com, Anne said: “They hate people who are a lesbian, they hate gay people, they don’t like it… you have to be sentenced if you are promoting it, you have to be sentenced to life imprisonment. So many people have been mistreated; even one of my tenants…one day they destroyed my houses, one of my tenants was killed. Because at this stage I was having nightmares about going back to Uganda and being killed because these people, they don’t like homosexuality.”
Campaigners say Anne will “face certain danger” if she returns to Uganda.
