Muslim Group hails Anti-LGBTQI Bill
The Muslim Professionals Association has welcomed the passage of the Promotion of Human Sexual Rights and Ghanaian Family Values Bill (Anti-LGBTI Bill) and commended Parliament for the laudable step.
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It also commended the National Coalition for Proper Human Sexual Rights and Family Values for its tireless advocacy in favour of the bill.
“We salute the yeoman’s efforts of the coalition, made up of the National House of Chiefs, the Office of the National Chief Imam, the Christian Council and the Catholic Bishops’ Conference in supporting the Bill, alongside the various moral voices that were raised to demand action to safeguard the cultural and moral fabric of the nation,” the association said in a press statement signed by its president, Dr Abdul Samed Muntaka.
President
The association was worried the Executive appeared to have developed cold feet as evidenced by the caution from the Ministry of Finance to the President not to assent to the bill on the spurious pretext that it could cost the country some losses in foreign aid and investment.
To the association, that betrayed a lack of conviction on the part of the ministry that the Ghana Beyond Aid agenda was realistic and worth pursuing.
The association, therefore, reiterated calls on President Akufo-Addo to sign the bill into law as it sought to promote and protect proper family values and reproductive rights in Ghana.
It urged all presidential candidates for the 2024 elections to publicly state their support for the bill and commit to upholding it when signed into law, or to sign it, in the unlikely event that the present administration failed to do so.
Describing the bill as comprehensive, it said it went through a vigorous process of consensus building and made room for contributions from various stakeholders reflecting the outlook of Ghanaians on the LGBTQ menace and taking cognisance of all relevant issues.
“More importantly, the bill provides for expert care, counselling and rehabilitation of LGBTQ people and criminalises all extra-judicial attacks on persons known or suspected to belong to that group or found to be engaged in gay or lesbian practice,” it said.
They indicated that the mosque and the church were ready to offer counselling support to those who sincerely wish to be helped out of the LGBTQ trap.
“We think this is more humane than the position of the LGBTQ rights advocates. In fact, it is wickedness, rather than compassion, to encourage deviants to remain defiant, despite the well-documented psycho-social, physical and emotional distress that comes with the LGBTQ lifestyle,” the association said.
Abuse
The Muslim Professionals Association said it shared the view of the Ghanaian public as captured in the bill, and underpinned by the distinctive African cultural values which held that gay and lesbian practices were aberrant.
“Even those who practise it, do so in utmost discretion, they themselves acknowledging that it is culturally offensive,” it said.
It celebrated the fact that all the forces that were summoned in support of the bill were indigenous and well-grounded in the cultural values of the country.
It frowned on the intention of some proponents of LGBTQI to organise street processions and “flaunt their deviant behaviour like a trophy” explaining that sexual relations in the Ghanaian culture were private matters.
“That is why even straight or heterogeneous couples do not display open public affection, much less organise a parade of depravity and obscenity in the name of gay pride,” it said.
As Muslims, the members of the association said they were worried about what would become of their mothers, wives, daughters and sisters if a heavily bearded man insisted in the name of transgender rights, to use the female washroom in a mosque, market, lorry station and other public places.
That, they said, would be “an abuse of our rights too. We support all legal measures to stop the cancer from growing in our society”.