There Is Hope For Dr. Ali-Gabass

Some holier-than-thou have welcomed the prosecution of Dr. Sulley Ali-Gabass with gay. Indeed, justice has been served the sixteen-year old school pupil, who was on several occasions sexually molested by Dr. Ali-Gabass. The justly incarceration of Dr. Ali-Gabass is an explicit warning to those who have pedantry desire to promote homosexuality in the country. Indeed, Ghana has spoken to the effect that there is no room for homosexuality in the country.

Even so, I would want to add my voice to the call by the Christian Council of Ghana for the president of the republic to officially reiterate Ghana’s anti-homosexual stance. Mr. John Dramani Mahama has precedence: In 2006, the Kufour’s government did not allow homosexuals and other bisexual group to host a conference in Ghana. In 2011, the late president, Prof. John Evans Atta Mills, also came clear on the issue. In the case of Atta Mills, he had to take a firm stance against the practice at a time when the British premier, David Cameroon, had threatened to cut aid to African countries that relied on British aid, if they do not relax and liberalise their stance on homosexuality.

Responding to the sentence by the Accra circuit court, presided over by Mrs. Rita Agyeman Budu, the lawyer for Dr. Ali-Gabass, Phixon Owool, pleaded with the court to consider the social status of Dr. Ali-Gabass and temper justice with mercy. This call has been reiterated by a few my friends I have interacted with. The concern that is he is a rare senior medical doctor, and the court should have considered his status in society. This argument is inane and weak on two points. First, such request does not answer the question, ‘how do we deal with the sixteen-year old boy whose life has nearly been destroyed by the sodomy acts of Dr. Ali-Gabass?’ Is the sixteen-year old victim of Dr. Ali-Gabass also not a human being? Second, the plea does not take into account the legal mantra that the law is no respecter of anyone. The poor boy, who was sodomised by a doctor who should have known well deserves to be served with justice. And again the law needed to be enforced to serve as a deterrent to other people of high class who would take advantage of their social standing to deprive others of their rights. I know of instances where female colleagues of mine were sexually abused by some professors. There are some ‘big men’ who take advantage of their privileged position in the society to gain illegal sexual access to those on the fringes of societies. So, at best the argument that the judge should have considered the position of Ali-Gabass to temper justice with mercy is nothing short of a fallacy of appeal to mercy (argumentum ad misericodiem).

The Medical and Dental Council of Ghana is also looking forward to taking a decision to revoke the license of Dr. Ali-Gabass. This decision is to bring sanity to the medical profession, and to also remind members within the fraternity to take charge of their moral lives. It is also a tacit way of saying that moral failure could not be excused because of one’s social standing. So, Dr. Ali-Gabass is suffering a double jeopardy: first he will be languishing in prison for 25 years, and second he is likely to forfeit his rights to practice as a qualified gynecologist until further notice.

In spite of the seeming gloomy future for Dr. Ali-Gabass, I certainly believe that there is hope for him. He has the chance to reform and be useful to society. We are all fugitives before God, and in need of redemption. None of us is a saint and none of us is without a scar and a blemish. The only difference is that we have not been served with divine justice yet, because divine justice is a deferred justice, which has eternal ramifications. As I said, I would least celebrate the imprisonment of Dr. Ali-Gabass because we are all capable of any imaginable crime. There is none too holy not to fall into sin, and there is none too sinful not to be redeemed. Life is not yet over for Dr. Ali-Gabass: he could go the way of Rev. George Adu Bonsu, also known as Benjilo, who accepted the invitation of the Lord Jesus while he was still serving prison sentence. In earthly prisons, we stand the chance of being reformed; we are privileged to a second chance. But, alas, in the prison of eternal damnation, we become incorrigible and do not have any second chance. Thus, compared to eternal damnation, earthly incarceration is just an earthly rehearsal.

Prison is not the end of life; it is the beginning of a new life. Earthly prison in the writings of Jeremy Bentham, the philosopher, is designed to reform social misfits to fit well in society. In his Panopticon, Bentham meticulously provides a detailed description of the physical structure of a prison. His work provides the basis for the structure of the prison system in the so-called developed countries. Unfortunately, the conditions of our prisons, based on my visit to Nsawam mini prison, are not conducive for such reformation. The Ghana Prisons Service and all stakeholders should get involved to give our prisons a facelift. The prison is the likely home of all of us, and since we are all potential criminals, the earlier we advocate its improvement, the better would it serve us all.

The last issue of hope for Dr. Ali-Gabass is that Jesus did not come for the righteous. He came for sinners, of which all of us are included. Dr. Ali-Gabass, thus, has the chance of giving his life to the Lord Jesus Christ, the divinely appointed savior of the elect. The prison should give him some time from social stress and trying to please society to consider the possibility of engaging Jesus Christ. History is replete with instances where hardcore criminals have had an encounter with the Lord and as a result turned for the better. As a Zongo boy, I know of friends who were very much reformed for social living after they had served some years in prison, and more importantly given their lives to the Lord. Growing up in a Zongo community, I was a hardcore guy, fighting here and there, but since I met the Lord in 2004, my life has been changed for the better. It is not that I don’t sometimes fall into the trap of sin, but the grace of the Lord has empowered me to live above avoidable reproach.

Indeed, there is hope for Dr. Ali-Gabass. Jesus has a second chance for him. All he needs is to accept His offer of salvation, and be made a saint even in prison.

Satyagraha!!!
Charles Prempeh ( [email protected] ), Makerere Institute of Social Research, Makerere University, Uganda