Uganda's "Kill-The-Gays" Pastor Accused Of Extortion And Bribery To Push Bill

"Poo-Poo Pastor" allegedly resorted to extortion several times.
May know who killed activist David Kato

Rev. Martin Ssempa may have a hard time getting his beloved "kill the gays" bill passed, even though he's tried for years to have Ugandan homosexuality criminalized and some gays put to death. Last week, it seemed that, with the help of Ugandan legislator, David Bahati, the bill would surely go through Parliament, but there were rumors that the bill would be killed. Yesterday, taking matters into his own hands, Ssempa brought what he said were two million signatures in support of the bill and even brought two "ex-gays" to testify how they had been indoctrinated by slain gay activist David Kato.


The two "ex-gays," Paul Kagaba and George Oundo summarily spoke to speaker of Parliament, Edward Kiwanuka Ssekandi in the company of Ssempa and Bishop Julius Oyet. They both related how they were "indoctrinated" by Kato by being raped by him after which  both became gay activists for a time until brought under the pastoral influence of Ssempa.


Ssempa, it seemed, had made his final, definitive argument for the (now internationally infamous) "kill the gays" bill.


Then an hour later, George Oundo was able to speak to the New York Times:

“David Kato was murdered; it was a plot,” Mr. Oundo said. “I don’t support the bill.”
I’ve always been gay,” Mr. Oundo said, in a timid but growing voice. “I didn’t choose it.”
“David Kato was the first one who taught me to protect my human right,” Mr. Oundo added.
Mr. Oundo said that his presence alongside Mr. Ssempa at Parliament had been to “protect” himself and that he had been contacted only that morning by Mr. Kagaba about the meeting and offered about $42 to attend. He said Mr. Ssempa had offered him about $2,000 in 2009 to repent and switch sides in the debate, but later reneged. Either way, Mr. Oundo became a poster-child for Mr. Ssempa’s anti-homosexuality movement.

Mr. Ssempa declined to comment on the allegations.

Mr. Oundo's last words to the Times: “If I live or die, I am gay, and if I am buried, bury me gay,” he said.


Martin Ssempa is an enigma of sorts: his siblings died of AIDS and he told himself that it was their promiscuity that caused their death. At the time, he was a celebrity: a national break dancing champion. He eschewed fame for membership in a local Baptist Church and performed in plays to educate students about AIDS. He studied sociology and received a Masters of Arts Degree at Philadelphia Biblical University. NOTE: there is no reference to Mr. Ssempa ever receiving a Masters of Divinity from PBU or any other institution. His own website DOES NOT MENTION ORDINATION OF ANY KIND, yet he insists on being called "Pastor" and dons all the trappings of ordained clergy (see picture above).


Ssempa also gained some international influence by working with George W. Bush's PEPFAR (President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief) and Pastor Rick Warren's Saddleback Church. It should be noted that, for some unknown reason, the two had a falling out and Warren has since distanced himself from Ssempa.


While campaigning against homosexuality, Ssempe repeatedly portrayed gays as people who regularly eat feces and practice extreme forms of anal sex, earning him the sobriquet of "Eat Da Poo-Poo" Pastor. He has also been known to accuse his rivals of pedophilia and homosexuality. Such accusations, once substantiated, can lead to catastrophic straits and everyone in Uganda knows that people have been brutally beaten, ostracized and, like David Kato, killed. 


George Ounda's accusations may lead to an inquiry (if Ounda is willing to testify), but any full-blown investigation is doubtful: Ssempa's influence runs as high as President and Mrs. Mousseveni. Ssempa also has connections with the U.S.'s Christian Right: "Prophet" Lou Engle and organizations like Family Research Council and American Family Association. 


I've written before about Rick Warren's influence in Africa, particularly Uganda, so something puzzles me: just what was it that made Warren cut off association with Ssempa? It must have been something quite serious because after all, Ssempa has long held to Warren's motto:


"Whatever It Takes." 

Now Coming To YOUR Church: Evangelism and Gay Porn

Pastor Martin Ssempe's new tactic to see all gays killed reached a new low when he showed gay pornographic slides in a Kampala church. He hoped to get more support for the "kill the gays" bill.

Pam's House Blend

The screening was attended by around 300 supporters crammed into an evangelical church in the Ugandan capital after plans for a 'million-man march' were thwarted by police. 'We had planned to have a million-man and -woman march in Kampala but unfortunately we were told that we could not march because of security concerns," Martin Ssempa told the crowd. 'The major argument homosexuals have is that what people do in the privacy of their bedrooms is nobody's business but do you know what they do in their bedrooms?,' the pastor asked. Ssempa then displayed a slide show of gay pornographic pictures. 'This one is eating another man's penis,' the pastor said, before going into even more graphic descriptions. 'Is this what Obama wants to bring to Africa?'

No, I don't think it is. He wants to bring something that Ssempa hasn't seen for years: civilization. I know that's harsh and some might say see the statement as racist, but just think how our own Christian Right is trying to drag us all (kicking and screaming) back to the Middle Ages. Christofascists see Africa as new meat: "there's redemption in them thar hills and we's gonna get us a whole passel of brand spankin' new converts. Yessiree!"

And people like Rick Warren are exporting homophobia as fast as possible. Of course, Warren has denounced the "kill the gays" bill, but only after a lot of pressure. And other high-ranking evangelicals are beginning to look like "Hitler's Pope," Pope Pius XII, who gave only a small, vague remonstration to Hitler and the Holocaust. For the Pope, it was a trade-off or rather, being on the side of the lesser of two evils: back Hitler, but not Stalin. And in the case of Uganda, gays, like Jews, are expendable. If killing gays en masse begets just one conversion, then so be it. It's like Rick Warren's motto: "Whatever it takes."

And yesterday's headlines concerning mass hysteria in Kenya will please a great many of the Christofascists.

365gay.com

The wave of anti-gay sentiment in Kenya continues to grow. The mob violence on Feb. 12 over the alleged wedding of two gay men has led to house-to-house searches for gays, attacks on gays in the street and the sacking of an AIDS clinic.

So now Martin's Seempa's homophobia (and by extension, Rick Warren's) has spread.

One of the questions I have for Pastor Ssempe: what video were your slides from? Was it "To The Last Man" by Raging Stallion? Was it the wonderful take-off on Tim LaHaye's novels called "Kiss My Left Behind?" Was it "Folsom Undercover?" Was it "The Bigger The Better?" The guys in those films didn't look gay at all. Or did you show something like "Castro Twinks Get It On." That one would have you marching in San Francisco like the angry villagers in Frankenstein. Wouldn't that be fun?

OK, so I'm flippant. Did you expect anything less? Some people deserve to be treated jovially but dismissively or they just don't get the point. OK, I'll cut out the flippancy because it's too be easy to dismiss Ssempa's mentality as one of a typical Central African tyrant whose problem-solving skills entail only jail sentences, torturde and executions. His reasoning is fed by the U.S. evangelical community which owns him. His leaders cannot accomplish anything without the sanction of people like Rick Warren and Franklin Graham. And so Ssempa targets Barack Obama.

Seempa never seems to realize that Uganda (and now Kenya) has to exist with more globalized societies. China realized it years ago. So did Russia. And if he and Musevene want to imitate capitalist democracies such as ours, he'll have to deal with certain ethical principals.

Theocracies are NOT democracies by any stretch of the imagination. But sacred cows like Ssempa would rather not have democracies standing in their way. Again, like his mentor's motto: "Whatever it takes."

Poor Uganda. Poor Kenya.

Poor Africa.