Ghana’s vile anti-LGBTQ+ bill is ‘effectively dead’, country’s president says
Activist Prince Frimpong believes Ghana could “never recover” if a bill that imposes prison sentences for identifying as LGBTQ+ and supporting the queer community passes into law. (Getty/Prince Frimpong)
Ghana’s president has said that a proposed law which would have made identifying as LGBTQ+ or campaigning for queer rights illegal is now “effectively dead.”
The Promotion of Proper Human Sexual Rights and Ghanaian Family Values bill, which would have strengthened existing anti-LGBTQ+ laws, is now unlikely to advance, president John Mahama is quoted as saying by the Washington Blade.
Mahama, who only took office on 7 January, explained that although MPs passed the bill last February, it needed to be approved by former president Nana Akufo-Addo before being signed into law, but parliament was dissolved before he did so.
The law would have imposed a prison sentence of up to three years for those who identified as LGBTQ+ and up to five years for those who organised or funded queer groups.
Anyone involved in LGBTQ+ advocacy campaigns aimed at minors would have faced a 10-year jail sentence.
“I don’t know what the promoters of the bill intend to do but I think we should have a conversation about it again,” Mahama said. “As far as I know, the bill did not get to the president. The convention is that all bills that are not assented to law before the expiration of the life of parliament, expire. So, that bill effectively is dead.”
Despite LGBTQ+ campaigners and activists celebrating the death of the bill, queer people in Ghana still face persecution under legislation dating back to colonial times.
According to the queer rights website Equaldex, it is illegal for men to be gay, while the country does not afford any protections against discrimination fro LGBTQ+ people. Changing gender, same-sex marriage and same-sex adoption are all outlawed.
When the bill was passed by MPs last year, activist Prince Frimpong told PinkNews that the legislation threatened to spark a “witch hunt”.
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