GHANA: MOB TRIES TO LYNCH LGBTI STUDENT, ATTACKS FAMILY HOME

A 21-year-old student has reportedly been arrested in Ghana on accusations that he is gay and was “recruiting other youth into the practice.”

According to Peacefmonline.com, police detained Yakubu Abdul Kadri in Bugya, a farming community in Northern Ghana.

Police said that he was arrested after angry locals tried to lynch him for “engaging in sexual escapades with other young men in the community.”

The claims against the young man are being investigated and the authorities have yet to decide if they will press charges.

“Residents have however vowed to personally to kill the suspect if he is released by the police insisting that gay practice is alien to the customs and traditions of the people of the Bugya Community,” states the report.

It adds: “They have threatened to wipe his entire family if he is not ostracized from the community on religious grounds.”

The family’s home was also reported to have been raided by weapon-wielding residents led by Sheik Mahamadu Alhassan, a local Muslim Cleric.

The mob warned the family “to take their son elsewhere on his release as he was reported to be a bad influence on other youth in the community.”

The Commission for Human Rights and Administrative Justice and other human rights groups have condemned the conduct of the area’s residents.

While the report describes Kadri as a gay man, the accompanying picture and report indicate that he wears women’s clothing. He may possibly identify as a transgender woman and not as a gay man, although this remains unclear.

Gay sex is illegal in Ghana and carries a sentence of three years imprisonment. In May, it was reported that a group of Muslim youth had killed a man they accused of being gay.

A 2012 US Department of State Human Rights Report found that “LGBT persons faced widespread discrimination, as well as police harassment and extortion attempts” in Ghana.