On May 29, 2026, the Ghanaian Parliament passed an anti- LGBTIQ+ law. People who identify as LGBTIQ* as well as their allies face prison sentences of several years under this law. This article explains that the primary drivers of this current anti-rights wave in Ghana are actually external, ultra-conservative Western actors whose regressive agenda goes against the culture of quiet tolerance of pre-colonial Ghanian societies.
This text was written by a Ghanaian activist before the law was passed. The Hirschfeld-Eddy Foundation knows the person’s name but is not publishing it for security reasons.
In a typical Ghanaian society, the family is a distinct pillar of the country’s social fabric, defined by deep care, hospitality, and an innate understanding of human coexistence, with a hint of diversity. Historically, traditional Ghanaian societies accommodated diverse expressions of identity, anchoring the concept of family in solidarity, shared responsibility, and the protection of every community member.
Today, however, this indigenous heritage of broad tolerance is under severe threat. The introduction of the draconian Human Sexual Rights and Ghanaian Family Values Bill (commonly known as the Anti-LGBTQ+ Bill) in 2021 marks a stark, regressive shift. Rather than protecting our genuine local values, this legislative push is being used to sweep decades of our rich, existing cultural, family, and community progress, tolerance, economic empowerment, and organizing straight under the carpet.
The progressive kind of society that a typical Ghanaian typically understands, accepts, and lives harmoniously is about to be triggered by some foreign influence that barely has an idea what family means to us. An introduction to a “Family Values Bill” is a direct insult and undermining of what our forefathers had left behind for us through oral tradition, as a primary way of preserving our beliefs and values from one generation to another.
As a Ghanaian human rights defender and feminist, resisting the anti-rights tide is a vital struggle for the soul of our democracy. The fight for our future requires standing firm against legislative regression, patriarchal structures, and coordinated transnational pushbacks targeting marginalized communities.
The Illusion of Neo-Colonialism: Promotion of Local Hate
The current anti-rights wave in Ghana is frequently marketed by its proponents as an organic, domestic defense of African culture against Foreign influence. However, a closer look at the imagery behind this movement reveals a striking irony. The primary drivers of this regressive agenda are themselves external, ultra-conservative Western actors using our political leaders as the face for this action.
The upcoming Fourth Interparliamentary Conference on Family Values and Sovereignty, scheduled for June 2026 in Accra, is a clear example of this coordinated import operation. Far from an organic grassroots gathering, the conference is heavily financed and directed by foreign figures, including:
- Sharon Slater: President of the US-based organization Family Watch International, designated an anti-LGBTQ+ hate group by civil rights watchdogs.
- Henk Jan van Schothorst: Executive Director of Christian Council International, based in the Netherlands, whose network openly claims credit for drafting the African Charter on Family Sovereignty and Values.
These external actors are utilizing Ghana’s democratic credibility to launder an international anti-rights agenda. By importing heavily funded, highly punitive legal frameworks, they seek to codify discrimination and dismantle the civic spaces that local feminists and human rights defenders have spent decades building.
The Political and Religious Weaponization of the Bill
The rise of this anti-rights movement has been accelerated by domestic political expedience. With critical elections and political transitions on the horizon, various political parties and figures have weaponized the bill, transforming human lives into political capital. By utilizing selectively curated religious dogmas and distorted cultural morals, politicians have successfully shifted public focus away from pressing socio-economic challenges, setting up sexual minorities, especially the LGBTIQ+ communities, as scapegoats.
This strategic deployment of moral panic directly undermines the rule of law and constitutional protections. It forces a rigid, exclusionary legal framework onto a society whose historical structures were fundamentally pluralistic. The cost of this political regression is devastatingly high, manifesting as increased state-sanctioned violence, psychological trauma, and the systematic erasure of vulnerable citizens from public and private life.
Once sovereignty is invoked, no one can challenge it. The government will go ahead to criminalize who you love, deny you healthcare, access to the right information, education, and the right to freedom of association, among other privileges. By defining who should be part of a family and what it should look like, whilst excluding others who do not fit within their policies.
The Parliamentary Battle on Memoranda and Civic Mobilization
As the anti-LBGTIQ bill has moved through parliamentary channels, the frontline of this legislative struggle has centered heavily around Parliament’s Committee on Constitutional, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs. Tasked with reviewing the bill’s constitutional compliance and social implications, the committee became a vital focal point for intense civic mobilization. Recognizing the stakes, a powerful coalition of local advocates, public health experts, and civil society organizations stepped directly into the fray to mount a rigorous defense.
Chief among these efforts was the submission of detailed legal and human rights memoranda, spearheaded by the prominent “Big 18” group of Ghanaian lawyers and academics alongside the broader Human Rights Coalition since 2022 to date. These meticulously drafted memos dismantled the bill clause by clause, proving that the legislation flagrantly violates the fundamental rights to dignity, equality, privacy, freedom of speech, and non-discrimination guaranteed under Ghana’s 1992 Constitution.
Through these formal memos and highly contested public hearings, activists have continuously engaged with lawmakers. They have presented empirical data demonstrating the catastrophic economic fallout, the collapse of HIV/AIDS public health programming, and the severe erosion of democratic freedoms that would occur if the bill is finalized. This unyielding engagement has thrown sand in the gears of the anti-rights movement, ensuring that the legislative path toward bigotry is fiercely and formally contested at every single turn.
Reclaiming the Ancestral Definition of Family
To counter this regression, Ghanaian activists are engaging in a vital act of narrative reclamation. They are challenging the anti-movement’s narrow, colonial-rooted definition of the family by reminding the public of what African family structures actually looked like before external, fundamentalist interventions:
- Interconnectedness Over Exclusion: Traditional families were extended networks built on mutual aid, where the safety of the individual was tied to the well-being of the collective.
- A Culture of Quiet Tolerance: Pre-colonial Ghanaian societies prioritized social harmony and community integration over the state-enforced surveillance, policing, and imprisonment of individuals based on their private identities.
- Indigenous Protection: True traditional values center on shielding community members from harm, rather than exposing neighbors, children, and siblings to violence and legal persecution.
- Ownership: There has been an increase in owning our stories and telling them as they are. We understand how sharing the lived realities of our communities can help shape the kind of narrative these anti-groups are pushing.
Standing Firm in the Shadows
In the face of immense state pressure, social stigma, and foreign-backed hostility, Ghanaian human rights defenders, feminists, and queer activists have demonstrated profound resilience. They refuse to allow the foundational pillars of language justice, equality, and civic safety to be dismantled. Operating both in the public eye and from the necessary shadows, local movements are continuously organizing to protect sexual minorities, provide vital support systems, and challenge the constitutionality of regressive bills.
When legislative frameworks criminalize a population, social norms naturally strip away their humanity, institutional gaps deny them safety and security, and economic vulnerability leaves them completely exposed to exploitation.
Grassroots precarity in a state of persistent uncertainty, instability, vulnerability, and insecurity towards an overall existence of LGBTIQ persons within their intersections is the direct, structural result of a system working exactly as designed to persecute, discriminate, exclude, and harm marginalized communities within the broader society.
By unmasking the foreign interests driving local hatred, Ghanaian activists are rewriting the blueprint for the country’s future, one firmly rooted in authentic liberation, indigenous solidarity, and human rights for all.
A Ghanaian activist
Hintergrund:
Am 29. Mai 2026 verabschiedete das Parlament in Ghana ein Anti-LSBTIQ*-Gesetz. Sowohl Menschen, die sich als LSBTIQ* identifizieren, als auch Allies drohen darunter mehrjährige Haftstrafen. Dieser Text ist vor der Verabschiedung des Gesetzes entstanden. Er stammt von einer*m ghanaischen Aktivist*in. Der Name ist der Hirschfeld-Eddy-Stiftung bekannt, wird aus Sicherheitsgründen jedoch nicht veröffentlicht.
A publication for Hirschfeld Eddy Foundation as part of the project “The Pink Factor: LGBTQI+-Rights in the Geopolitical Conflict about Values and Resources”.
