By Melanie Nathan, January 10, 2025.
Assuming office this past week, Ghana’s new President said: "This administration will work tirelessly to ensure every Ghanaian, regardless of your status or background, is treated with dignity and afforded equal protection under the law". However we all know this flies in the face of the stance that the new President John Mahama, has taken with regard to the LGBTQI+ issue in Ghana. It is a known fact that when a Ghanaian politician or government official makes such an assertion, he is not normally including sexual and gender minorities or LGBTQI+ persons.
President John Mahama was speaking at the 92nd annual meeting of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Mission on January 9, 2025, mere days after taking office, in a country where 93% of its populace said that they would not tolerate living next door to a homosexual.
In keeping with the voracious anti-LGBT country climate, 2024 saw the passage of Ghana’s version of Uganda’s “Kill the Gays Bill,” named in Ghana as the Proper Human Sexual Rights and Family Values Bill (Family values Bill). This law, keenly fashioned in typical U.S. Evangelical mold, is still set to realize the over $50 million dollar investment made by its American promoters, in the mission to ensure such legislation in as many African countries as possible.
The law was passed in February 2024, but never signed into law by former President Nana Akufo-Addo, who chose to pend his assent by refusing delivery of the Bill until the two merged constitutional challenges to the law were adjudicated upon by the Supreme Court. As it turned out the Chief Justice kept delaying the cases until December 2024, when Akufo-Addo was about to leave office. The Court finally dismissed the challenges on December 18 based on prematurity – ruling that the Court could not decide such a case based on law that was not fully in place as the President had yet to assent to it. So the President never got to assent, and now there is a new Parliament and new president.
This was the perfect play for a piece of legislation that served as a political ping pong ball, landing in the court of the new President. John Mahama, who in his campaign had promised to sign the bill into law. Now, January 2025, as a new Parliament is about to be seated, Parliamentarian, Hon. John Ntim Fordjour has pledged to push this Anti-LGBTQ Bill in the 9th Parliament and has said he will force President Mahama to sign it.
Fordjour, MP for Assin South and former Deputy Minister for Education, has vowed to work with other MPs to reintroduce the "Human Sexual Rights and Family Values Bill, 2024" (Anti-LGBTQ Bill) in the 9th Parliament.
Speaking on 'Okay FM' two days ago, Ntim Fordjour said their goal is to push President John Mahama to fulfill his campaign promise to sign the bill into law.
Ntim Fordjour, a Senior Pastor at Higher Heights Sanctuary, stated that Mahama and the ruling NDC campaigned on passing the bill, capitalizing on the NPP's failure to enact it, which he believes contributed to their election loss.
He emphasized that Ghanaians, especially religious and traditional leaders, supported Mahama's anti-LGBTQ promises, expecting him to deliver.
The MP also highlighted that 7 of the 8 original sponsors of the bill, including NDC MP Sam George, are part of the new Parliament, ensuring continued advocacy for its passage.
The new law criminalizes anyone who identifies as LGBTTQAAP, so called promotion of LGBTQI rights, allies or advocates supporting LGBT rights, and has an extradition clause that makes a fugitive of all LGBTQI+ people, and it has more, providing stringent punitive measures including life in prison.
Now in sum: The opposition, Ntim Fordjour remains committed to criminalizing LGBTQI+ people in Ghana and ensuring the bill is reintroduced to become law, hand in hand with the ruling party, which campaigned on the issue, and hand in hand with a new President who has promised to sign it. Things do not look good for the gays of Ghana. Notwithstanding all these antics, the fact remains that Ghana has been and will continue to be an extremely dangerous country for LGBTQI+ people, where the old Penal Code continues to be a robust license for state violence by state and non- state actors and the new legislation looms to make it worse, whether passed or not.
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COUNTRY CONDITIONS EXPERT WITNESS
CONTACT: Melanie Nathan, B.A. LL.B
Melanie Nathan, Executive Director of African Human Rights Coalition is a qualified country of origin expert witness in the United States and global immigration courts, providing expert written country conditions reports and testimony for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, non-binary, LGBTQI + asylum seekers from African Countries, to include those perceived as such, activists, allies and human rights defenders.
Melanie also consults multinational corporations regarding briefings and policy for operations and issue impacted by anti-homosexuality laws and country conditions. SEE HERE
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