Ghana’s Speaker of Parliament, Alban Bagbin, has acknowledged that the anti-LGBTQ+ bill passed at the end of May contains errors. Rather than dropping it, he intends to have it corrected and passed again at Parliament’s next sitting.

Parliament passed the Human Sexual Rights and Family Values Bill on 29 May 2026. Speaking at a conference in Koforidua in October, Bagbin said the bill had been rushed through in his absence and that last-minute amendments had introduced mistakes. These are to be corrected in a second consideration, after which the bill is to be passed as a cross-party matter. Sessions previously announced for July and August did not take place. The bill has not yet been submitted to President John Mahama for assent.

The bill provides for up to three years’ imprisonment for people who identify as LGBTQ+ or enter a same-sex marriage. Promoting or funding LGBTQ+ activities could carry up to five years. Supporters, including many religious communities and traditional authorities, see it as protecting Ghanaian family values. Human rights organisations strongly criticise the bill and fear the reconsideration could be used to reinstate harsher penalties that had previously been softened.

The situation also has consequences in Germany: in August, a chamber of the Berlin Administrative Court ruled that Ghana cannot be classed as a safe country of origin because of the persecution of queer people. For LGBTQ+ people in Ghana, the situation remains marked by uncertainty for now.