Member of Parliament for the Ningo-Prampram constituency, Sam George has advised President Akufo-Addo to be extra careful of the individuals he views as allies.
This comes after President Akufo-Addo revealed concerns raised by countries deemed to be friends of Ghana over the recent passage of the Proper Human Sexual Rights and Ghanaian Family Values Bill, also known as the anti-LGBTQ bill.
In a circular shared by Director of communications at the office of the President, Eugene Arhin, the President said, “l am aware that last week’s bi-partisan passage by Parliament of the Proper Human Sexual Rights and Ghanaian Family Values Bill, on a Private Member’s motion, has raised considerable anxieties in certain quarters of the diplomatic community and amongst some friends of Ghana that she may be turning her back on her, hitherto, enviable, longstanding record on human rights observance and attachment to the rule of law. I want to assure you that no such back-sliding will be contemplated or occasioned.”
The bill’s approval has been met with criticism, notably from Virginia Evelyn Palmer, the United States Ambassador to Ghana, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, among others.
But Mr George expressed that the president should not hinder the preference of Ghanaians based on some threats from bodies he views as Ghana’s allies.
Addressing his colleagues in parliament, Sam George emphatically asserted, “My friends will not blackmail me with money, so if we are being told today in the president’s statement that he is giving the friends of Ghana assurance that he is not going to hasten to the ill that this sovereign government has passed, preventing the will of the Ghanaian people.”