The leaders of both countries believe that homosexuality is a sickness; one says it might exist in the West because of "abnormal breeding".
When such scientifically stupid views come from the top, it's no surprise that ordinary people take that as encouragement to carry out pogroms against gay people.
In the Ugandan capital, Kampala, Parliament is poised to enable tougher anti-gay laws. These will not only result in a witch hunt for homosexuals, it could cause a rift between Uganda and the United States.
President Obama has already called the proposed laws "odious", and hinted that the US may have to consider the amount of aid it gives to Uganda.
The country already has laws banning homosexuality, but the new legislation tightens the restrictions, raises the penalties, and catches lesbians in its snare. If the legislation is passed, then people could face life imprisonment.
The original draft would have authorised the death penalty in some cases, but this was taken out after an international outcry. It will also be a crime not to report gay people to the police, and anyone discussing homosexuality, without condemning it, risks being imprisoned.
Over the weekend Mr Obama's national security advisor, Susan Rice, phoned Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, urging him not to sign the bill. If he doesn't, a two thirds majority in parliament can still force it through - but some lawmakers may not support the measure if the president comes out against it.
At time of writing it appears the president will back the bill, which would be a popular move in Uganda. Mr Museveni is on record as believing that gay people are sick, he approves of them being jailed, but not for life, and he is against the death penalty for homosexuality.
He has played the race card. Along with many African politicians he has argued that homosexuality is a Western disease. He has even written that "it could be that the Western societies, on account of random breeding, have generated many abnormal people".
That comment is up there with former President Ahmadinejad's remark that there are no gays in Iran. It's possible the president knows how stupid this is, how it flies in the face of all recorded history, but he's smart enough to know it plays well with large section of Ugandan society, and elsewhere on the African continent.
Those who fear homosexuality can hide their prejudice behind this pseudo-science whilst at the same time make out they are on the side of their indigenous culture, protecting it from evil western ways.
The self-righteous gay haters in Nigeria follow the same reasoning - all the way to murdering people. Last week four men were lucky to escape with their lives when mob of 50 beat them up in the capital Abuja.
The four were then dragged to a police station where the officers continued to beat them for being gay. The men risk being caught in a web of laws compromising Nigeria's new Same Sex Marriage (Prohibition) Act, and jailed for up to 14 years. There are several ironies here.
The laws banning same sex relationships are similar to those the apartheid regime in South Africa used to ban sex and marriage between different races.
Part of the justification used to justify the apartheid laws was underpinned by a version of Christianity, and religion plays a large role in the current situation in Nigerian and Uganda.
It is also ironic that some of the existing anti-homosexual laws right across Africa were inherited from the European colonialists.
They were left on the statue books when the Europeans went home. They've moved on, the laws are stuck in an era of prejudice. news.sky.com
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