Nana, Bawumia between a rock and…

Alhaji Dr Mahammadu Bawumia is praying multiple prayers.

Should his personal enemies and political opponents be privy to his petitions to Allah since the LGBTQ+ bill was passed by Parliament last week, they would describe his prayers as contradictory.

As Vice-President and head of the Economic Management Team, which is tasked with bringing relief to the suffering of Ghanaians, it is Bawumia’s prayer that IMF and World Bank funds should flow into the economy.

But he is also a Muslim and in principle against LGBTQ+.

So what is the content of his prayer, seeing as the bill, when passed into law, would stack all religious bodies – Christians, Muslims and traditionalists - against his presidential ambitions in the December polls?

Advisedly (should I say, tactically), he himself has never been heard on the issue: we only assume that as a Muslim, he is anti-gay.

What a burden on one man!

There is a heavier burden and it is on the President.

If, 16 years ago, a prophet or a tarot pack reader had divined 2024 to Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, he may, in all probability, have called off his ambition to be President of Ghana.

This is because what faces him, nine months to the end of his tenure, is not usual with mortals: it does not happen often that a person faces the toss of the coin and is told that “heads you lose, tails, you lose”. 

This is exactly where the President, known by those who love him as “Nana Showboy”, finds himself in the last nine months of his mostly troubled reign.

He is now faced with a situation from which it is impossible to extricate himself – unless by a providential act of deliverance. 

His finance ministry has laid the cards on the table before him: that if he signs the bill into law, "Ghana is likely to lose US$3.8bn in World Bank financing over the next five to six years.

It explained that while "there is no direct conditionality relating to the passage of the bill, the non-disbursement of the budget support from the World Bank will derail the IMF programme."

The President could claim that he is ignorant of the human rights implications of the Bill, but here, also, he has no help.

His Attorney General has spelled it out: “Parts of the bill, in its present form, violate some fundamental rights and freedoms enshrined in the constitution, including the right to freedom of expression, thought and conscience and freedom from discrimination.” 

I am not a lawyer but how am I supposed to understand what the AG is espousing considered against the backdrop that gay sex is already against the law in Ghana, punishable with a three-year prison sentence.

Section 104 of the Criminal Code states that a person convicted of having “unnatural carnal knowledge” may face different penalties depending on what act he or she commits.

"Unnatural carnal knowledge" is defined as sexual intercourse with a person in an unnatural manner or with an animal.

So what is new? Where have the rights activists, the World Bank and the IMF been all these years?

Was the provision in the Criminal Code not anti-human rights enough?

The MPs who sponsored the bill said their push was in response to the opening of Ghana's first LGBTQ+ community centre in Accra in January 2021 which was shut down by the police following public protests, including religious bodies and traditional leaders.

Akufo-Addo himself is on record as saying that he would criminalise homosexuality or give it his blessing “if the majority of Ghanaians want him to.”

But now it looks like he has no say in the matter.

Ranked against the mighty local and international wall of opposition to the bill are the groups and individuals who make up over 99% of the population.

The Ghana Catholic Bishops Conference has urged the President to waste no time in signing the bill into law.

They did not stop there but actually reminded the President that going into the December polls, the head of his NPP is in the mouth of their congregants all over the country. 

A similar veiled threat has been issued by the Ghana Pentecostal and Charismatic Council whose General Overseers, Chairmen, archbishops and General Superintendents hold sway in decisions by large populations of worshippers.

They number in the millions.

From the Islamic front, the Chief Imam has spoken. The head of Muslims in Ghana has praised Parliament for passing the bill.

It seems to me strange that the bill is ranking such formidable opposition against Ghana.

Already 33 nations with a Muslim majority have anti-gay laws.

Some of them, like Saudi Arabia, are friends of the West. 

An equal number of countries, this time with Christian majority, are also anti-gay.

Why is there no such vehemence in the protests by IMF and World Bank?