Sexual Minorities Uganda (SMUG) is an umbrella non-governmental organization based in Kampala, Uganda. Headed by Executive Director Frank Mugisha and Chairperson and founder Victor Mukasa and formerly co-headed by Advocacy Officer David Kato

David Kato

David Kato Kisule was a Ugandan teacher and LGBT rights activist, considered a father of Uganda's gay rights movement. He served as advocacy officer for Sexual Minorities Uganda...

 (until his murder in January 2011), it pushes for the protection and human rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Ugandans.

Founded in 2004, the organization is composed of a number of member organizations:

• Icebreakers Uganda (a group which focuses on LGBT research and youth issues)
• Integrity Uganda (a group which focuses upon the integration of religion with LGBT identity)
• Freedom and Roam Uganda
• Spectrum Uganda

History

The organization was founded by Victor Mukasa, a female-to-male transgender activist, on March 3, 2004 in Kampala at the Kaival restaurant and Internet cafe. Among the earliest members were Val Kalende and David Kato, who were among the first board members. Members of SMUG achieved controversy through their activism and legal troubles for much of the organization's history, and the profile of the organization increased due to the later-2000s rise of homophobic populism in the country and the introduction of the Uganda Anti-Homosexuality Bill

Uganda Anti-Homosexuality Bill

Uganda's Anti-Homosexuality Bill is a legislative proposal that would broaden the criminalisation of same-sex relations by dividing homosexual behavior into two categories: "aggravated homosexuality", in which an offender would receive the death penalty, or "the offense of homosexuality" in which...

 in the Parliament by David Bahati

David Bahati

David Bahati is a Ugandan politician and MP in the Ugandan parliament. He is the MP for the constituency of Ndorwa West and is a member of the National Resistance Movement, the ruling party of Uganda...

.

In response to an article in the Ugandan newspaper Rolling Stone

Rolling Stone (Uganda)

Rolling Stone was a weekly tabloid newspaper published in Kampala, Uganda. The paper published its first issue on August 23, 2010, under the direction of 22-year-old Giles Muhame and two classmates from Kampala's Makerere University...

(of no relation to the American publication of the same name, which rejected the Ugandan paper and its actions as "horrific") which published a gallery of "100 Pictures of Uganda's Top Homos Leak" and stated "Hang Them", three members of SMUG whose faces appeared in the magazine - David Kato Kisule

David Kato

David Kato Kisule was a Ugandan teacher and LGBT rights activist, considered a father of Uganda's gay rights movement. He served as advocacy officer for Sexual Minorities Uganda...

, Kasha Nabagesera

Kasha Nabagesera

Kasha Jacqueline Nabagesera is a Ugandan LGBT rights activist. She is the founder and executive director of an LGBT rights organisation called Freedom and Roam Uganda. She has publicly campaigned for an end to homophobia in Uganda, where homosexuality is illegal...

 and Onziema Patience - filed a petition to the High Court seeking for the ending of the paper's circulation of the article. The petition was granted on November 2, 2010, effectively ruling for the end of the Rolling Stone publication.

However, at 1 p.m. on January 26, 2011, Kato, whose picture was among the 100 listed in the Rolling Stone article and was featured on the cover of the edition, was assaulted in his home in Mukono Town

Mukono Town

Mukono Town is a municipality in Mukono District, Central Uganda. The town is administered by Mukono Town Council, an Urban Local Government within Mukono District Administration. Mukono Town has links to the English town Guildford.-Location:...

 by an unknown male assailant who hit him twice in the head before fleeing on foot; Kato later died on route to the Kawolo Hospital. The murder was decried by Human Rights Watch

Human Rights Watch

Human Rights Watch is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Its headquarters are in New York City and it has offices in Berlin, Beirut, Brussels, Chicago, Geneva, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, Moscow, Paris, San Francisco, Tokyo,...

, with senior Africa researcher Maria Burnett adding that "David Kato's death is a tragic loss to the human rights community".

On September 15, 2011, Executive Director Frank Mugisha was designated as the recipient of the annual Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award for his activism.