By Melanie Nathan, March 04, 2025
A group of ten members of parliament in Ghana have resubmitted the controversial anti-LGBTI Bill that seeks to impose some of the harshest measures and restrictions on LGBT rights in Africa.
The bill prescribes a three-year jail term for people who merely identify as LGBTQIAA, (this includes allies) and five to ten years for promoters and advocates.
The same legislation was passed by Parliament in 2024. The former President, Nana Akufo-Addo, declined to sign it into law before leaving office in January, on the basis that the legislation had become the subject of legal challenges in the Ghanaian Supreme Court. During 2024, politicians and interest groups threw darts at each other, many demanding the president's signature. The Court, after many months of sitting on the challenges without ruling, finally dismissed the cases on the basis that because the President had not signed there was in fact no existing valid law to render a decision upon.
The entire set of events served several purposes, to include election year politicking with scapegoating of gays, annoying an anti- gay populace where over 90% abhor LGBTI people, all of this heightening the harms and dangers for LGBTI people in the country.
The new law of 2024 was widely condemned by both local and international human rights groups, with some describing it as draconian.
At the dissolution of the previous Parliament ahead of last December's general election, all bills that had not completed the legislative process, including receiving the president's signature, were dropped.
While is unclear whether the speaker of the new parliament will admit the bill for consideration, he is faced with its extensive popularity. However he also has the conflicting ideal proposed by the new President John Mahama, who campaigned on his promise to sign an anti-LGBTI bill, but who since in office has suggested he would prefer to see a government sponsored bill focused on the educational aspects to thwart homosexuality, rather than the current form of a private member bill.
LGBTI relations are already punishable by up to three years in prison in Ghana by an old law that survived a ruling of Constitutionality in the Ghanaian court..
According to BBC the President has said: "I do think that we should have a conversation on it again so that all of us, if we decide to move that bill forward, move it forward with a consensus." Supporters claim the legislation would help preserve what they consider to be Ghanaian culture and family values.
However rights groups have decried the legislation.
"The anti-LGBT rights bill is inconsistent with Ghana's long-standing tradition of peace, tolerance, and hospitality and flies in the face of the country's international human rights obligations," said Human Rights Watch researcher Larissa Kojoué last year. "Such a law would not only further erode the rule of law in Ghana, but could also lead to further gratuitous violence against LGBT people and their allies."
Va-Bene Elikem Fiatsi, a Ghanaian trans woman and LGBT activist, told the Reuters news agency the bill's reintroduction was "disheartening and hard to process" but insisted LGBT activism would continue.
The bill's potential impact on Ghana's economy is a significant concern. The country's former finance minister warned that passing the bill could result in Ghana losing up to $3.8bn (£2.9bn) in development funding from the World Bank and affecting its $3bn (£2.3bn) IMF support program.
Opposition lawmaker John Ntim Fordjour told Reuters the country no longer needed to fear economic sanctions, citing the election of Donald Trump as US president. "The global political climate is favourable for conservative values as demonstrated in the bold conservative pronouncements of President Donald Trump," he said.
Melanie Nathan, ED of AHRC: At African Human Rights Coalition we are privy to the horrific impact of the anti-LGBTI climate made worse by the introduction of this new law, yet again. The climate has persisted with added voracity since the law was first introduced back in 2021. We work with LGBTI Ghanaians who are forcibly displaced by the violence licensed through the controversy of this new bill, existing criminalization, and hefty religious and societal taboos. It is important to note that the very consideration and political abuse of the bill makes things worse for LGBTI Ghanaians. We hope that the new president will find ways to protect all the people he is charged to protect as citizens of Ghana. The President must preserve culture and tradition through authentic reflection on the actual history and values of the country, rather than on that imposed by American Evangelicals, who in effect have re-colonized Ghana by exporting their homophobia to Ghana. Let us hope the new anti-Africa mission of the Trump administration does not continue to foster the export of homophobia to Ghana and the entire continent. the innate identity and sexuality of human beings cannot be criminalized. All Ghana has to do is to stop taking instruction from the West as clearly evidenced with language such as FAMILY VALUES BILL. Ghana ought to meet the challenge to preserve its culture in a manner that is inclusive of all its people, and does not criminalize human beings for who they are and who they love. It starts with stepping away from the colonizers and the lies they have spread about sexual orientation.
Comments