Ghana's tragic turn toward anti-LGBT extremism

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Source: Washington Post

Opinion ǀ Ghana’s tragic turn toward anti-LGBT extremism

By Karen Attiah
June 10, 2022 at 4:23 p.m. EDT

Under the administration of President Nana Akufo-Addo, Ghana has been meticulously exporting an image of the country as a safe destination for Black people and Ghanaians in the diaspora. For years, the nation known as the Black Star of Africa has been seen as a beacon of tolerance and peace.

But no matter how bright stars shine, they all fade and die eventually. A horrifically repressive anti-gay bill in Ghana is a tragic example of how my father’s homeland is rapidly succumbing to the gravitational pull of fundamentalist hatred of LGBTQ people.

First, some context. Many African countries have anti-gay laws still on the books from their colonial eras. Ghana, a religiously conservative country and former British colony, has long outlawed “unnatural carnal knowledge,” though the law has rarely been enforced. In recent years, a few African countries have started to remove those colonial-era laws. Mozambique did so in 2015, followed by Botswana and Angola in 2019.

Not so for Ghana. Local LGBTQ activists told me things took a dark turn in 2019, after the World Congress of Families, a U.S.-based Christian group, organized a conference in Ghana. The group’s goal was to push harsh criminal punishments for LGBTQ behavior, as it succeeded in doing in Uganda and Nigeria several years ago. “They confidently said they were going to do the same thing in Ghana” said Alex Donkor, the executive director of LGBT+ Rights Ghana, an advocacy group, who was at the conference.

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Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/06/10/ghana-lgbt-homophobia-law/

Non-paywalled link: https://wapo.st/3xv0uUO