Be gay, go to jail?
In Ghana, lawmakers approved a bill to criminalize the so-called promotion of LGBTQIA+ activity. The Human Sexual Rights and Family Values Bill, 2025 was passed by a voice vote after the Constitutional and Legal Affairs Committee recommended its adoption.
The bill, which was introduced last year after Ghana’s president John Dramani Mahama took office:
- penalizes same-sex sexual acts with up to three years of jail time.
- bans “funding, sponsorship or promotion” of LGBTQIA+ acts, with prison terms ranging from three to five years
- introduces a “duty to report” prohibited LGBTQIA+ acts to a police officer or other authorities, with violators facing up to three years behind bars
The bill also amends Ghana’s Extradition Act of 1960 to make offenses under the new law extraditable offenses.
This is actually a rehashed version of an earlier bill, submitted in 2024 under former Ghanaian president Nana Akufo-Addo, who never signed it into law.
All over West Africa, a handful of anti-LGBTQIA+ legislations have been passed – e.g. in Senegal this March, the country’s president Bassirou Diomaye Faye signed a bill doubling the maximum prison term for same-sex sexual acts to 10 years, and criminalizing any efforts to promote homosexuality; and in Burkina Faso in September last year, lawmakers criminalized same-sex sexual acts, and criminalized “behavior likely to promote homosexual practices and similar practices”.
