Nana Oye Lithur
INFORMATION GATHERED by DAILY GUIDE indicates that most members of the Appointments Committee of Parliament have rejected the nomination of the Minister-designate for Gender, Children and Social Protection, Nana Oye Lithur, because of her entrenched position on gay rights.
However, the paper learnt there was mounting pressure from senior party officials, calling on the partisan MPs to okay the nominee with the argument that her rejection would be an embarrassment to President John Dramani Mahama.
At the time of filing this report yesterday, some National Democratic Congress (NDC) officials were seen shuttling between the Parliament House and Osu Castle, holding serious negotiations with members of the Appointments Committee to let Oye Lithur go through.
Incidentally, the nominee was also seen with the new US Ambassador to Ghana, Gene Cretz paying a courtesy call on the Speaker of Parliament, Edward Doe Adjaho and the Parliamentary leadership, just 24 hours after her nail-biting vetting.
The courtesy call has generated some speculations as to whether there were western lobbyists backing the embattled Gender, Children and Social Protection minister-designate and gay rights in Ghana.
Sources close to the Appointments Committee made up of only ruling NDC members have said that they intended recommending to the House in their report, the rejection of Oye Lithur since her intention to defend gay rights was an affront to the cultural norms, sensibilities and sexual orientation of the majority of Ghanaians.
Per an advertised business programme yesterday, the Appointments Committee chaired by First Deputy Speaker and former Deputy Attorney-General Ebo Barton-Odro was expected to present its report on the ministerial nominees to the House for approval today.
It is not immediately known whether members of the committee would stand their grounds by rejecting Nana Oye Lithur or they would kowtow to pressure of NDC officials and the presidency.
Oye Lithur, a human rights activist, was on Wednesday grilled for over three hours during which she forcefully stated she would continue to defend and protect the rights of everybody in Ghana, including gays or homosexuals.
“I will not promote homosexuality, but I will protect the rights of everybody, including homosexuals,” she quickly told the Appointments Committee when she took her turn at the ongoing ministerial vetting in Parliament.
Nana Oye’s strong response came on the heels of serious opposition by religious bodies including the Concerned Clergy Association of Ghana to her nomination.
They formally petitioned the Appointments Committee to register their reservations about the nomination of the human rights and gender advocate for the top job.
Critics said her stance on sexual orientations was too liberal for Ghana and hence she did not deserve to serve in a ministry that would be responsible for a plethora of social issues including the rights of women, and possibly homosexuals.
The embattled human rights advocate was taken through hours of a gruelling session of questions and answers that flew from all angles from the Appointments Committee.
Notwithstanding numerous demands by members of the Committee on Oye Lithur to denounce homosexuality in Ghana, she insisted even though she would not call for promotion of the practice, she would defend the rights of gays.
“I have never said that homosexuality should be promoted or that I will promote homosexuality. I have never said that homosexuality should be legalized,” she reiterated.
Observers of the vetting concluded that Nana Oye’s vetting was the most interesting, as legislators bombarded her with an endless barrage of questions concerning her views on sexual orientations which she virtually parried preferring to stick strictly to constitutional provisions for the protection of rights of every Ghanaian.
“I believe in our law and I believe in our constitution as a person…I have read it and it reflects the mirror of our aspirations as a people and it is this constitution that guarantees fundamental human rights.
“In Chapter five of our constitution, it says that everybody is entitled to fundamental human rights,” she told the clearly exhausted members of the committee who had tried unsuccessfully for hours to corner her to make specific pronouncements in support of homosexuals.
A member of the Appointments Committee and MP for Asawase in the Ashanti Region, Mohammed Muntaka Mubarak, tried to outwit Oye Lithur by citing an analogy of what she would do if her male children showed homosexual tendencies.
But the nominee declined to answer, insisting such an issue would be personal to her, hence she would not want to disclose that in public.
Opposition
The Vice Presidential candidate of the Convention People’s Party in the 2012 polls, Nana Akosua Frimponmaa, is asking the Appointments Committee not to approve Nana Oye.
Nana Frimponmaa believes Nana Oye’s position on gays and lesbians was dangerous and will not help the children of the country.
The moderator of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church of Ghana, Right Rev. Prof. Emmanuel Martey, is asking Parliament not to approve the nomination of Nana Oye.
He said that her stance on homosexuality and lesbianism was very dangerous to the moral health of the society.
The moderator told Joy FM yesterday that Nana Oye Lithur was at the forefront of promoting homosexuality.
Prof. Martey said that he expected Nana Oye to be honest in answering the Committee’s questions, but as far as he was concerned, she was rather evasive, dishonest and inconsistent.
The moderator called her a coward whose submissions before the Parliamentary Committee were disgraceful.
He asked why the minister-designate avoided giving pointed answers and standing by her previous views on the subject if she believed “what she stands for is good and will help Ghana”.
“…Oye Lithur was lying yesterday…She cannot speak a simple truth,” he claimed, adding that, “We need leaders of integrity.”
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