It will not take more than a simple understanding of the arguments being made by several Ghanaians and our own President-John Atta Mills to acknowledge that, in fact, the Professor with majority of Ghanaians are confusing morals with law. It happens a lot especially when your moral values are in direct conflict with a legal standing.
The law is complex and no matter how it is construed, its interpretation can be stretched to give rights when the actual lawmakers may not have intended to do so.
I have laughed heavily several times for hearing people claiming homosexuals have NO legal rights in Ghana because the constitution of Ghana does not expressly give them any. What most of us have to realize is that, the law does not only give rights expressly, certain times, they are implied.
I am not an expert on Ghanaian laws but still have enough knowledge to make this simple deduction.
The legal argument that homosexuals have no rights in Ghana and their actions constitute a criminality has mostly been founded on Chapter 6, article 104 of the Ghanaian Criminal Code which prohibits “unnatural carnal knowledge”. This is defined to include consensual sexual intercourse between men.
Notably, the true effect of this clause is that, it encourages discrimination and persecution against homosexuals on the basis of their identity and consensual sexual behaviour.
The above law which subjects homosexuals to discrimination is a criminal code, meaning the constitution of Ghana is supreme to it in terms of legal hierarchy.
Article 17 of the constitution of Ghana however guarantees the right to freedom from discrimination. What this means is that, under the constitution you cannot discriminate against anyone for being homosexual (identity and sexual behaviour) whiles the criminal code says the direct opposite- ‘homosexuality’ by a stretch of the law is illegal.
These two laws are in direct conflict with each other and as mentioned above, the constitution is supreme so automatically, it is the constitution that should take precedent.
Based on the above constitutional provision, homosexuals can simple argue that they have the right to their sexual orientation and must freely be allowed to express and practice it. They can do so by arguing that under Article 17, such a prohibition or not being allowed to hold and practice their sexual preference (criminalizing it with any code) is DISCRIMINATION, a breach of their constitutional right…
Also, the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, ratified by Ghana in 1989 affirms the equality of all people and even gives homosexuals more grounds to operate freely. Article 2 expressly guarantees the right to freedom from discrimination, article 3 guarantees equality before the law and article 26 outlines the duty of all individuals not to discriminate….So as a Ghanaian, you have a duty not to discriminate against any person or set of people including homosexuals.
So until Article 17 is repealed or amended and probably the African Charter too, homosexuals have rights to their activities and possibly to even marry in Ghana…We must learn to make a distinction between morals and laws especially when these two opposes each other.
No matter your moral standing or cultural beliefs, the law is the law and someone’s right is his right whether expressly or impliedly given.
Discriminating or segregating the minority (homosexuals) is not the way forward. As someone rightly said, if you want to know how civilized a society is, simply look at how they treat the minority.
I feel like its okay if the constitution allows for gays to not be discriminated upon and tortured and killed and abused, but i dont feel its okay if gay marraige, and permissions for gays to adopt is allowed
I personally feel the law which allows for gays to be arrested is useless. How does that solve the problem? They should rather send them to spiritual counselling, cos me i personally feel its a mental/spiritual problem. Sneding them to prison wont solve anything
It is really unfortunate we are allowing today’s so call advance world mix up with proper moral and core values. Lets be real is marriage not between a Man and Woman? This gay thing is becoming too much you just sign on to a website and there we go, man and man kissing or woman to woman. What is this? God have Mercy on us, we are forgetting Sodom and Gomorrah. What is Wrong is Wrong and i don’t believe God Make mistakes. This is Pathetic!
I guess from the writer is saying, it can also be deduced that Muderers, armed robbers, prostitutes and rapist all have rights and they should not be discriminated against right? They are all in the minority too and im we could say that all they need is councelling or spiritual help so why they shd not be taken to prison, lets wise up people, what is wrong IS WRONG! if we allow this, very soon we will justify sleeping with animals
it is NOT our culture. It is total nonsense. They should drop the subject on Ghana radio stations. We have not reached such low levels of moral decadence and I hope we never do. taboo!
Finally Ghana has a Equal Rights activists whose not hiding behind a computer. I wish them well. But it should be noted there is no legislation yet on the part of President Obama’s support.