Vincent Ekow Assafuah, Deputy Minister-designate for the Ministry of Local Government, Decentralisation, and Rural Development, has stated that while he fully supports the passing of the anti-LGBTQ+ bill, he believes that just excluding homosexual people from society is not the solution.
He said that lawmakers should be engaged in reforming homosexuals rather than allowing them to go astray.
On February 28, Parliament enacted the law on Human Sexual Rights and Family Values, often known as the anti-LGBTQ+ bill.The measure outlaws LGBTQ+ activity and makes funding, advocacy, and promotion of the group illegal.
The act’s sponsors and promoters might face sentences ranging from three to five years in prison, while those found guilty of the act could face a sentence of six months to three years in prison.
Speaking about the measure on Monday, March 11, during his vetting by the Parliamentary Appointments Committee in Accra, Mr. Assafuah said that the legislature should be in charge of ensuring that gays are reformed and reintegrated into society.
“In principle, the LGBTQ bill that has been passed or approved by parliament is one that I support wholeheartedly because it is in consonance with my tradition and culture. It is in consonance with my formation as a catholic person or practising catholic.
“However, there are reasons for punishment to be meted out to people. There is a principle behind punishment and one of the principles is to ensure that a person is being reformed out of a criminal activity. And so, if we have to reform persons, do we have to mete out punishment that seems to ostracise the person from society? It seems that as a society, we are bringing out our failures in the sense that we are showing our inability or incapacity to be able to reform people or if you like put people through sessions that reintroduce such persons into society. If we are not able to do so. That is where I see the failure.”
“It seems we are throwing our hands in despair. I am making a strong point that as a Parliament, we should be very interested in reforming our people. That is our responsibility as a people. We cannot say that there is a supposed anticipation of gay persons being lynched if they are given community service and so because of that as the people’s representatives we are throwing our hands in despair to allow such persons just to go astray.
“That cannot be our course. Let’s have a proper forum, let’s have proper engagements to see how best we can deal with such persons. It is our responsibility to do so,” he stated
