Dr Jeffrey Haynes, Professor Emeritus of Politics, London Metropolitan University, UK
By Professor Jeffery Haynes
President John Mahama recently spoke at the Assemblies of God Church General Council Meeting at Gomoa Fetteh in the Central Region. Addressing pastors, imams and other religious leaders, the president urged both restraint and responsibility, both in public affairs and in their use of social media, when addressing issues of inter-faith relations in Ghana.
Religious leaders occupy a unique place in Ghana. They are not ‘just’ preachers. They are also counsellors, community heads, moral compasses and in times of joy, grief and confusion, many Ghanaians turn to them for comfort and safety. As a recent editorial in the Daily Graphic noted: ‘A word from the altar, the mosque, or a church WhatsApp platform can shape opinions, calm fears, or unfortunately, spark them. In an age where a single sentence can circle the globe before a sermon ends, words have never carried more weight.’
Inter-faith relations in Ghana
Christianity and Islam both arrived in what is today Ghana in the 15th century. Both have been influenced and shaped by local cultural values. Today, the faiths share identity characteristics and both are well integrated into the country’s culture. Over time, inter-faith relations between Muslims and Christians have developed harmoniously.
Islam is said to have preceded Christianity in Ashanti, the dominant power in pre-colonial Gold Coast/Ghana, The Asantehene, monarch of the historical Ashanti Empire and today ceremonial ruler of the Ashanti people, sought to accommodate both religions affably. Over the next four centuries, indigenous Ghanaian society was refashioned by the arrival and development of the two faiths.
In the early 1900s, both Christianity and Islam were followed by about 10% of inhabitants of the then Gold Coast. By the 1940s, Christianity was the faith of a quarter of the population, while Islam remained around 10%. By 1960, 40% of Ghanaians were Christians, and the percentage of Muslim was, at this time, growing very much more slowly.
Between 1948 and the early 2020s, the percentage of Ghana’s population which classified itself as Muslim rose from four to just under 20 percent, that is, around seven million people in a population of around 35 million. Today, Islam is the second largest faith in Ghana, second only to Christianity. During the same period, that is, from the late 1940s to the early 2020s, Christianity grew from around 30% to 71%, that is, approximately 25 million Ghanaians. Today, there are approximately four times as many Christians than Muslims in Ghana.
Threats to religious tolerance
President Mahama’s recent warning did not come in a vacuum. Despite Ghana’s long and envious record of inter-faith accord, there have been warning signs that religious interactions can be problematic. For example, some Christians fear the importation of jihadi violence from neighbouring countries. Muslims, on the other hand, may not welcome what they see as aggressive Christian proselytisation. This is not to suggest that generally relations between Christians and Muslims in Ghana are under serious threat, only to note that there are growing inter-faith strains and tensions.
For the past few decades, peaceful co-existence between Christians and Muslims in Ghana has not been without tensions and sometimes conflict. Global and regional trends of religiously motivated conflict are manifesting themselves in Ghanaian society. Christian nationalism in Ghana has grown in recent years and observers link this growth to the burgeoning Pentecostal and Charismatic churches, to which most Christian nationalists are affiliated. Some Christian nationalists in Ghana are strongly anti-Muslim and some Muslim militants are strongly anti-Christian.
Ghana’s 107-year-old chief imam, Osmanu Nuhu Sharubutu, a member of Ghana’s National Peace Council, is a crucially important figure in helping to maintain religious harmony in Ghana. He is not only nationally revered as an erudite Islamic cleric but is also an important peace broker, who in 2016 received the ninth Martin Luther King award for Peace and Social Justice from the US embassy in Ghana. The University of Ghana has conferred on Chief Imam, Osmanu Nuhu Sharubutu, an honorary doctorate degree him for his role in mediating various conflicts in the country and ensuring national unity.
Several prominent Christian leaders in Ghana are highly recognised for their exceptional work in fostering interfaith relations, particularly in building bridges between the country’s Christian majority and its Muslim community. Christian leaders prominently dedicated to interfaith peace and harmony in Ghana include the Metropolitan Archbishop of Cape Coast, Most Reverend Charles G. Palmer-Buckle, the Catholic Archbishop of Tamale, Most Reverend Philip Naameh, and, respectively, the Vice-Chairman and General Secretary of the Christian Council of Ghana, Dr. Justice Adjei K. Lawson, and Reverend Dr. Cyril G. K. Fayose.
Much interfaith work is funnelled through the National Peace Council of Ghana. Rather than acting in isolation, Christian leaders collaborate systemically within this council alongside Muslim counterparts to quickly intervene in potential faith-based conflicts, underlining Ghana’s position as a global benchmark for interfaith stability.
Looking forward
To ensure continued interfaith harmony in Ghana, five proactive steps are required. First, institutionalise dialogue by establishing local, district-level interfaith councils to resolve disputes before they escalate. Second, standardise education policies to enforce uniform, inclusive guidelines in mission and public schools to protect minority students’ religious freedom. Third, regulate religious media by sanctioning broadcast hate speech and inflammatory preaching through the National Media Commission. Fourth, depoliticise faith by holding politicians accountable through joint Christian-Muslim peace pacts to prevent religious electoral mobilisation. Fifth, engage vulnerable youth by launching cross-faith economic empowerment initiatives to immunise youth against extremist exploitation from Ghana’s neighbours.
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