Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu
The Majority Leader and Minister of Parliamentary Affairs, Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, has berated Speaker Alban Sumana Kingsford Bagbin for taking sides and committing Parliament ahead of the debate on the controversial Promotion of Proper Human Sexual Rights and Ghanaian Family Values Bill.
According to him, it is not for the Speaker to make a predetermination for the House since he is not a Member of Parliament (MP), and that the issue at stake is “the business of Parliament.”
Addressing the media in Parliament on rising issues on the anti-gay bill on Tuesday, Mr. Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu stated, “If I heard right, the Speaker was even saying that the bill is going to be passed.”
“But I have a little bit of a challenge with that. Technically, the Speaker is not a Member of Parliament, and therefore the Speaker cannot commit Parliament,” he emphasised.
He said that although all MPs agree that the country’s cultural values and heritage should be protected and also that the LGBT issue is alien to the norms and values of the country, the process to ban the practice or otherwise should go through a fair process.
He indicated that what is within the power of the Speaker is to make a referral to Parliament which will be programmed by the Business Committee for consideration.
“I will find it difficult if we have a Speaker, in spite of his own antecedent as a former Member of Parliament, to say that Parliament is going to pass the bill. It’s a bit difficult, unless I didn’t hear him well,” he asserted.
“But if I heard well that Parliament is going to pass it, then that will present some challenges. I am not saying Parliament is not going to pass it, but the Speaker should not make a predetermination for the House because he’s not a Member of Parliament and this is the business of Parliament,” Mr. Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu noted.
“Elsewhere in many jurisdictions, Speakers are Members of Parliament. Some Speakers are even Majority Leaders. Here, in the wisdom of the crafters of the Constitution, we elected not to have the Speaker as a Member of Parliament,” he pointed out.
He said that Mr. Bagbin “would exercise some discretional circumspection in these matters,” and suggested that the Speaker might have been carried away, saying “Either than that he is an experienced Member of Parliament, so maybe he was lured into the debate.”
“But as I’m saying, I believe Parliament will do what is appropriate,” he reaffirmed.
Anti-Gay Bill
The Promotion of Proper Human Sexual Rights and Ghanaian Family Values Bill, 2021, which is under consideration by the Parliamentary Select Committee on Constitutional, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs, has generated heated debate across the country.
It followed a submission of a memorandum by a group of Ghanaian intellectuals who are demanding for authorities to reject the bill seeking to criminalise activities of LGBTQ+ people in the country.
They argued that the proposed law, when passed, would violate the right to “inviolability of the person” and all the key fundamental freedoms guaranteed under the nation’s constitution.
But religious groups in the country, who have thrown their support behind the passage of the bill, said new voices pushing for the rejection of the bill, are a stark reminder that the Ghanaian society is vulnerable to same-sex marriage.
They have consequently urged President Akufo-Addo to stop the creeping crisis before it poses a great challenge to the future of Ghana’s moral fabric.
The bill, which was introduced in Parliament on August 2, 2021, and read for the first time in the House, is being sponsored by eight MPs led by Samuel Nartey George of Ningo-Prampram.
The rest are Emmanuel Bedzrah, Ho West MP; Dela Adjoa Sowah, Kpando MP; John Ntim Fordjour, Assin South MP; Alhassan Sayibu Suhuyini, Tamale North MP; Rita Naa Odoley Sowah, Dadekotopon MP; Helen Adjoa Ntoso, Krachi West MP; and Rockson-Nelson Dafeamekpor, South Dayi MP.
By Ernest Kofi Adu, Parliament House