Lawmakers from Uganda and Ghana have met ahead of Ghana hosting a major conference of African MPs and faith leaders opposed to the rights of LGBTQ+ people.
Rights group Rightify Ghana has issued an alert over the planned gathering, which the Parliament of Uganda confirmed in a post on its Facebook page about the 11 February meeting.
The post stated that the 4th African Inter-Parliamentary Conference on Family and Sovereignty will take place in Accra, Ghana, from 27–30 May 2026.
Uganda Speaker Warns of “Cultural Distortions”
The post reported that, at the meeting, the notoriously homophobic Speaker of Uganda’s Parliament, Anita Among, urged African institutions “to advance the continent’s interests while preserving its values and traditions” and warned that Africa must protect itself against “cultural distortions”.
Previous editions of the anti-LGBTQ+ conference were hosted in Uganda, most recently in May 2025. President Yoweri Museveni and Uganda’s First Lady opened that gathering.
According to the Southern Africa Litigation Centre, 29 African Members of Parliament also attended the event, including the Deputy Speaker of Zimbabwe’s National Assembly.
Platform to Advance Anti-LGBTQ+ Hate
The conference is a platform to campaign against comprehensive sexuality education, promote anti-LGBTQ+ legislation and support restrictions on sexual and reproductive health and rights.
The gathering also endorses the African Charter on Family Values, a controversial initiative that seeks to “protect traditional family” and oppose “foreign ideologies” by rejecting LGBTQ+ rights and portraying queer people as a threat to children.
Rightify Ghana noted that the conference has links to Family Watch International, a fundamentalist Christian lobbying organisation that the Southern Poverty Law Center has designated as a hate group.
American and European right-wing groups, including Family Watch International, have a long history of funding and supported African efforts to undermine LGBTQ+ and women’s rights.
Growing Pressure in Ghana
Hosting the conference in Ghana marks a clear effort to bolster the anti-rights movement in the country and in West Africa, positioning Uganda’s 2023 passage of the Anti-Homosexuality Act as a model for other African nations.
In a report by New Vision, Ghana’s Second Deputy Speaker, Andrew Asiamah Amoako, explained the purpose of the 11 February meeting between Ugandan and Ghanaian lawmakers.
He stated: “We are here to take the mantle that Uganda started a couple of years ago, and that is about fighting for African values. Uganda has held this session three times and some of us have participated in all three. We have seen the importance of it.”
Just days after that meeting, lawmakers in Ghana reintroduced the anti-LGBTQ Human Sexual Rights and Family Values Bill as a private member’s bill in Parliament. If passed, the Ugandan-style legislation would dramatically escalate the persecution of LGBTQ+ people and their allies in the country.
