Ghana is set to pass an anti-homosexuality law after its Supreme Court blocked a legal challenge.

Same-sex intercourse is already illegal in the West African nation and is punishable by up to three years in jail.

The Ghanaian parliament has been debating the Human Sexual Rights and Ghanaian Family Values bill for two years, with most MPs in favour of it.

It would criminalise same-sex relations, being transgender and advocating for LGBTQ+ rights (which alone is punishable by up to 10 yeas in jail under the bill), Reuters reported.

A legal challenge, filed by academic researcher Amanda Odoi, said the proposed legislation would affect donor aid and other financial support for the country, according to the news agency.

However, the Supreme Court ruled last week that her arguments were not convincing enough to grant an injunction, meaning Ghana’s parliament has a clear path to getting the bill through its final stages and signed into law.

Shortly after the bill had its first reading in August 2021, a group of 13 United Nations experts called for it to be rejected, branding it “a textbook example of discrimination” and a “recipe for conflict and violence”.

They said it would promote conversion therapy, unnecessary medical procedures on intersex children and so-called corrective rape, where women are raped with the perpetrator claiming it was to make them heterosexual.