In February of this year, a piece of news made its way through the international media that affected us greatly. In our partner country Ghana, the “Promotion of Proper Human Sexual Rights and Ghanaian Family Values Bill, 2021” was passed by parliament. What initially sounds like the protection of individual rights is actually a massive tightening of the law against the rights of the LGBTIQ+ community. Even though the bill has not yet come into force and still requires the president’s signature, the situation for homosexual and queer people in Ghana is already precarious. Homosexual acts can be punished with several years in prison. If the new bill comes into force, people could already be punished for identifying as homosexual or queer and for supporting or advocating for the LGBTIQ+ community. The situation is not much different in our second partner country, Kenya. Homosexuality is also punishable here and the Federal Foreign Office expressly advises caution in this regard in public spaces in both countries.
The current developments in Africa have led to intensive discussions in our board meetings. Although we have not yet come into direct contact with the issue in our projects, it was important for us to position ourselves. From these discussions, we very quickly felt the need to reflect on our attitude towards development cooperation as a whole. This attitude relates not only to our work in our partner countries, but also explicitly to our work here in Germany. Here too, hostility towards queer people is on the rise.
We have set out what defines us in guiding principles that will continue to form the basis of our cooperation:
We, Ananse e.V., are a non-governmental organization that supports people with special needs. Specifically, we are involved in educational projects for people with disabilities in Ghana and Kenya.
In our project work, we focus on humanity:
- We work with everyone involved in the projects as equals.
- We treat each other with respect and listen to each other.
- We see diversity as an enrichment.
- We do not tolerate exclusion on the basis of faith, cultural identity, disability, sexual orientation or gender identity.
- We respect the principles of sustainability.
- We value transparency and disclose our goals and working methods.