Stop blackmailing Akufo-Addo into signing Anti-LGBT+ Bill - Freddie Blay 'reprimands' religious bodies

A former National Chairman of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Freddie Blay, has asked religious bodies to stop mounting pressure on President Nana Akufo-Addo to sign the Anti-LGBT+ Bill into law.

According to him, by mounting pressure on the president, the religious groups are blackmailing the country with their demand.

On February 28, 2024, parliament passed the Promoting Human Sexual Rights and Family Values Bill, 2024, also known as the anti-gay bill.

The bill when assented into law, will impose up to 10 years of imprisonment on anyone who engages in, supports, or promotes LGBT+ and its activities in Ghana.

Presently, the anti-gay bill is awaiting the president's assent, although he has said he will wait for the outcome of a legal challenge before making a decision on the bill.

But the decision by the president hasn't sat well with some religious groups and their leaders. By this, they have asked that President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo gives the bill priority and sign it as soon as possible.

However, the senior NPP member, in an interview with Kwesi Parker-Wilson on Kumasi-based Oyerepa TV, stated that the religious bodies should not threaten or blackmail the president over the bill.

To him, the bill is not a matter of morality but of human rights and tolerance.

"People should not, as it were, threaten to blackmail... of course it is. [The religious bodies] are blackmailing this country by saying, 'Sign it, throw people to jail.' Indeed, I would even say that if it's a question of morality they are talking about, there should be a law on getting people into jail for adultery. Why are they not doing it?” he questioned.

Freddie Blay explained further that adultery is also wrong but it is not criminalized in Ghana.

As a result, he urged society to accept the reality of the existence of LGBT+ people and tolerate them, rather than persecute them.

"[Adultery] is wrong; why aren't they making it criminal?... it's happening, although we frown on it, that you should go and sleep behind your wife or spouse, but it is happening. This is society; it's happening - the reality of our existence.

"I'm saying if, indeed, there are some people who are members of the LGBT+ tolerate them," he said.

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