By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.
Garden City, New York
July 13, 2015
E-mail: [email protected]
I have not been paying much attention to the sodomy case involving the convicted bisexual medical officer by the name of Dr. Ali Gabass, erroneously classified by many Ghanaian reporters as "The Gay Doctor." Bisexuality was widely known in both ancient Greece and the Roman Empire. A bisexual, of course, is somebody who is said or known to be equally sexually attracted to members of both two tradidional genders. Well, Dr. Gabass was accused of having had "unnatural carnal knowledge" of a 16-year-old boy. There is another story circulating on web media whose caption claims that the Effiankwanta, Sekondi-Takoradi, general medical practitioner had at some point in time attempted to snuff out the criminal case brought against him by the offer of a substantial amount of monetary settlement.
I have not been paying sedulous attention because Dr. Gabass' case comes in the wake of a massive anti-gay bashing fit throughout the country, especially among conservative Christain and non-Christian religious leaders, as well as some Ghanaian traditionalists who see the bisexuality of the accused to be anathema and decidedly "un-African." As of this writing, an Accra circuit court presided over by a judge named Rita Agyeman Budu (or is it Badu?) was reported to have sentenced Dr. Gabass to 25 years' imprisonment. And as had been widely expected, the lawyers for the convict are reported to be in the process of appealing the prison sentence, which some critics and observers have described as rather "too harsh" and even "unreasonable."
Some who are critical about the severity of his sentencing believe that Dr. Gabass, who had no prior criminal record, deserves a second chance. Maybe such plea is in view of the fact that the convict is a highly-educated and highly-trained professional in a field whose expertise is sorely lacking in the country, as many medical doctors are reported to have departed the country in droves, largely in search of better conditions of service. Others are apparently just thinking in terms of human foibles. But what is interesting to note is the fact that Judge Agyeman Budu threw out the second count of the two criminal charges preferred against the convict. This is quite interesting, if also because it clearly suggests that the very act of homosexuality is not considered a crime on the Ghanaian law books, as it were, or by the judicial system.
In recent years, the question of whether homosexuality, that is the coital aspect of it, is a justiciable act of criminality has been hotly debated among members of the Ghanaian public of divergent ideological suasion. The general belief here is that the criminal code, as bequeathed Ghanaians by their erstwhile British colonial overlords, has little to say on this subject. My initial fear here was that Dr. Gabass, who is reported to be married and is the biological father of several children by his wife, was likely to be used as a scapegoat by judicial activists hell-bent on stamping out the overt practice of homosexuality in the country. The decision to dismiss that aspect of the case against Dr. Gabass pertaining to his alleged homosexuality, comes as good news to those of us in both legal and extra-legal circles in the country who firmly believe that homosexuality is a purely private and personal affair that ought to be envisaged as being beyond the purview of justiciable acts of criminality, except where such expression of humanity violates another person's civil and human rights.
In other words, just like heterosexuality, as long as one's expression of his/her homosexuality does not verge into the clearly criminal territory of rape and harassment, one is safe and sound in the scheme of acceptable social conduct. And so it is clear that Dr. Gabass was convicted not because he is alleged to be of gay sexual orientation, but primarily because he had allegedly dared to violate the sexual integrity of a minor or an underage person. Now, I am not certain about what the law says about the minimum age of consensual sex in Ghana, but I do know that there are serving Members of Parliament who are known to have consorted with girls about the same age as the young man Dr. Gabass was accused of having sodomized.
At least one ruling-party parliamentarian is reported to have gone on record as having proposed that the nubile, or marriageable, age for women ought to be reduced to as low as 14 years old. Now, I find the mindset of such a politician to be far more criminal and dangerous than the charge for which Dr. Gabass was sentenced to 25 years imprisonment.
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