Ghana delaying action on anti-LGBTQ Bill after Court challenge
Ghanaian President Nana Akufo-Addo said he has delayed his consideration of an anti-LGBTQ bill after it was challenged in court, postponing a potential showdown with international lenders whose funding is key to the country’s economic recovery.
“A challenge has been mounted at the Supreme Court by a concerned citizen to the constitutionality of the proposed legislation,” Akufo-Addo said in a post from the president’s spokesman on Facebook Monday. There will be no further action until the court takes a decision, he said.
The bipartisan bill, which seeks up to three years in jail for people who identify as LGBTQ, could jeopardize Ghana’s access to vital international funding if it becomes law. Passed by parliament last week, it still needs the president’s signature to enter the nation’s statutes.
Ghana has faced criticism from its development partners since passage of the bill, which also legalizes discrimination and would force people to report anyone who’s gay to authorities, casting a cloud over its prospects for economic recovery.
The nation was granted a $3 billion bailout from the International Monetary Fund last year after defaulting on its debt, which it is in the process of restructuring. The IMF program comes with separate World Bank financing.
The IMF said it was monitoring the situation in Ghana closely and noted that its internal policies prohibit discrimination. Separately, Ghana’s finance ministry cautioned the country could lose about $3.8 billion of World Bank funding over the next five-to-six years if the bill is signed into law, according to a ministry document seen by Bloomberg.
Akufo-Addo, in the Facebook post, acknowledged the bill had caused anxiety among some of the country’s friends who viewed it as evidence that Ghana was “turning her back on her, hitherto, enviable, longstanding record on human rights observance and attachment to the rule of law.”
“I want to assure you that no such backsliding will be contemplated or occasioned.”
