STORY HIGHLIGHTS
- Ghana’s Parliament passed the Human Sexual Rights and Family Values Bill on May 29, 2026, for the second time, with penalties of up to ten years in prison for LGBTQ+ advocacy
- Family Watch International (FWI), an Arizona-based NGO, has been linked to the promotion of similar legislation across Uganda, Kenya, and Ghana — allegations the organisation denies
- FWI founder Sharon Slater has convened a series of “African Inter-Parliamentary Conferences on Family Values and Sovereignty,” with the fourth edition scheduled for Accra, June 3–6, 2026 — days after the bill’s passage
- The Southern Poverty Law Center has designated FWI a hate group; a Wall Street Journal investigation found a 2023 Uganda conference it supported received $300,000 from Russia
Ghana’s Parliament passed the Human Sexual Rights and Family Values Bill for the second time on Friday, May 29, 2026.
The legislation, which criminalises LGBTQ+ promotion activities, sexual acts, and even self-identification, now awaits the signature of President John Dramani Mahama, who has signalled he will sign it.
Parliament first passed a version of the bill in February 2024, but it expired without then-President Nana Akufo-Addo’s approval.
The timing of its passage — four days before Accra is set to host the fourth African Inter-Parliamentary Conference on Family Values and Sovereignty — was no accident.
Rightify Ghana, a Ghanaian LGBTQ advocacy group, noted in a series of social media posts that MPs passed the bill days before that very conference. For critics, the sequencing tells a larger story about who has been steering Ghana’s legislative agenda from afar.
The Organisation Behind the Curtain
Family Watch International (FWI) says its mission is to “protect and promote the family as the fundamental unit of society.”
It campaigns against teaching young people about LGBTQ issues, sexual health, and other areas it regards as a threat to the “natural family,” lobbying at the United Nations, across the U.S., and in other countries.
Founded and led by Sharon Slater, the Arizona-based NGO presents itself as an advocate for children and traditional values. FWI holds consultative status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations — a credential that lends it institutional legitimacy at international forums.
But its footprints in African legislative chambers tell a more contested story.
CNN investigated for months whether FWI and its founder Sharon Slater helped promote anti-LGBTQ+ bills in Uganda, Kenya, and Ghana — allegations the group has repeatedly denied.
Yet a CNN source with direct knowledge of the Uganda process stated that FWI staff made repeated changes to that country’s draft anti-homosexuality legislation, even suggesting clauses to be added to the text.
Slater denied involvement, calling the allegations “absurd.”
Sharon Slater and the Conference Circuit
The most visible instrument of FWI’s African strategy has been the African Inter-Parliamentary Conference on Family Values and Sovereignty.
The first edition, held in Entebbe on 31 March 2023, brought together parliamentarians from across Africa.
Uganda’s Minister of Information framed the gathering in explicitly anti-colonial terms, arguing that LGBTQ+ rights represented a new form of Western imposition on African culture.
One photo from that Entebbe conference showed FWI’s Sharon Slater standing in a small group with Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni outside Uganda’s State House.
For activists, it was a telling image: a conservative American lobbyist at the elbow of an African head of state, days before one of the continent’s harshest anti-homosexuality laws was passed.
Anti-LGBTQ+ legislation was introduced in Uganda and Ghana shortly after each previous year’s conference. The pattern has not gone unnoticed.
As Nicholas Opiyo, a leading Ugandan human rights advocate, put it: “The laws are very organized in their planning and the political mobilization of the population to support the cause. The passing of the law is just the tail end of that very meticulous process.”
Money, Russia, and a Global Network
The financial architecture behind FWI’s Africa work has drawn scrutiny beyond rights groups.
A Wall Street Journal investigation found that a 2023 Uganda conference supported by FWI and Sharon Slater received approximately $300,000 from Russia to help cover costs.
The revelation reinforced concerns that the “African family values” movement is not simply an organic cultural expression but a convergence of Western conservative ideology and Russian geopolitical interest.
Bloomberg reporting has shown that 17 U.S. conservative groups spent $5.2 million in Africa in 2022, a 47% increase from 2019, to champion legislation restricting queer and trans people’s rights. FWI has been named among the most active of these groups.
FWI has been designated a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.
The Accra conference, scheduled for June 3–6, is its fourth edition; Jeffrey Haynes, emeritus professor of politics at London Metropolitan University, has described it as “a strategic consolidation point for a broader, Western far-right-directed initiative with the objective of reshaping Africa’s governance, family policy, gender rights, and human rights frameworks.”
The Accra Conference and Ghana’s Central Role
A petition filed by activists alleges that Sharon Slater of FWI and Henk Jan van Schothorst of Christian Council International in the Netherlands are key figures supporting and financing the Accra conference.
Van Schothorst’s organisation is said to “publicly claim credit” for drafting the African Charter on Family Sovereignty and Values — the document that the conference is ultimately designed to advance.
Human rights defenders warn that the conference will target LGBTQ+ rights, women’s rights, sexual and reproductive health and rights, civic freedoms, and democratic participation across the continent.
That Ghana’s Parliament rushed the bill to passage days before the conference opened its doors in Accra was, analysts say, a deliberate gesture — a gift to visiting delegates and a signal of Ghana’s commitment to the movement’s broader agenda.
Pushback and What Comes Next
Opposition to the bill has not been absent.
Influential voices, including Cardinal Peter Turkson and politician Samia Nkrumah, have called for dialogue and inclusion, while Ghana’s Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice warned Parliament that the bill would infringe on fundamental rights of Ghanaian citizens.
Human Rights Watch has called the bill one of the most expansive legislative attacks on rights ever to come before Ghana’s Parliament, arguing it extends well beyond the regulation of conduct by criminalising identity and stifling expression.
With President Mahama’s signature expected, Ghana is poised to become the latest African nation to enact harsh anti-LGBTQ+ legislation — and Family Watch International, whatever role it played from its offices in Arizona, will be watching closely from Accra.
This article was edited with AI and reviewed by human editors
