A Justice of the Court of Appeal, Justice Eric Kyei-Baffour says the time has come for Ghana to find solutions to the challenges facing its religious rights.
According to him it is worrying the issues arising as a result of the freedom of Religion being practised in the country.
“Religious right is a component of human rights. They are all subset of the law. Religious rights now in Ghana appears to be an aspect of human rights that is posing one of the greatest challenges to us as a nation and I believe there is no better opportune time to deal with this than now because we appear to be grappling with matters of freedom of religion, belief, conscience and expression”
Justice Kyei-Baffour explained that these matters are manifested in the ongoing construction of the National Cathedral, state support for religious pilgrimage to Mecca, compelled religious worship in some second cycle institutions especially the traditionally mission schools, the annual ban on drumming and dancing controversy in the GA state, the claim by the Rastafarian religion of an infringement of their rights as far as keeping of dreadlocks are concerned in schools by Rastafarian students.
“Atheists, humanists, agnostics also consider the issue of national prayers and the pouring of libation during national programmes as a slap in their face since they feel excluded.”
Thus, he noted that because all these issues are confronting us as a nation it provides the right opportunity for us to discuss them extensively so that the challenges associated with them can be addressed.
Justice Eric Kyei-Baffour was speaking the 6th Legal Luminaries Platform organized by the Law Students’ Union (LSU) at the Faculty of Law in the University of Cape Coast.
Source: Rosemond Asmah/ATLFMNEWS
