Ghanaians generally have every reason to be proud of the level of religious harmony that we have enjoyed for
generations.
Our communities are populated by citizens of different ethnicities, nationalities, cultures and religions. Christians
live beside Muslims; Muslims do business with Christians; traditional believers share communities with both; and,
by and large, Ghanaians have learnt to accommodate one another.
It is relatively uncommon to see neighbours quarrelling simply because one is Christian and the other Muslim.
Indeed, anyone who attempts to victimise a neighbour on the basis of religion is quite likely to discover that the very
people expected to support him or her will turn against such conduct.
That is something worth preserving.
Ghana's religious tolerance is one of the country's greatest, though sometimes uncelebrated, achievements.
THE SCHOOL HAS BECOME THE BATTLEGROUND
It is therefore unfortunate that in recent times a rather unnecessary and increasingly heated debate has emerged over
Muslim students attending schools historically established by Christian missionary organisations.
The question is deceptively simple: Should a Muslim student attending a Christian mission school be compelled to
participate in Christian religious observances?
There are strong arguments on both sides of the debate, but there should be little argument about the fundamental
principle: a young person's religious identity and conscience should not be violated merely because circumstances
have placed him or her in an institution founded by another religion.
The controversy becomes even more difficult when one remembers the peculiar history of Ghana's mission schools.
These institutions were established by Christian missions for particular educational and religious purposes.
Similarly, Islamic organisations established schools to advance education within an Islamic cultural and religious
environment.
There is therefore nothing inherently objectionable about a school having a religious identity.
The difficulty arises when that identity is transformed into an excuse for religious compulsion.
I KNOW WHAT IT MEANS
I attended a Catholic secondary school.
Although I was not Catholic, I participated in Catholic services on Sundays and on special days observed by the
Church. At the time, I did not particularly object.
But with the benefit of hindsight, I can appreciate that the experience could have been considerably different for a
Muslim student.
A Christian attending a Catholic school might regard participation in a Catholic service as merely part of school life.
A Muslim student, however, may regard participation in a Christian religious rite as a matter affecting deeply held
religious convictions.
That distinction matters.
Religious freedom is not simply the freedom to worship. It also includes the freedom not to be compelled to
worship, profess or participate in a religious practice contrary to one's conscience.
That principle should concern Christians just as much as it concerns Muslims.
THESE ARE NO LONGER PRIVATE MISSION SCHOOLS
There is another factor which is often conveniently forgotten.
Ghana's mission schools may have been established by religious organisations, but many of them today operate
within Ghana's public education system and receive substantial public support.
The taxes that sustain the public purse do not ask whether the taxpayer is Christian, Muslim, traditionalist or non-
believer.
Christian taxpayers contribute to the education of Muslim children.
Muslim taxpayers contribute to the education of Christian children.
Traditional believers and persons who profess no religion contribute to both.
That is the nature of a constitutional republic.
Consequently, while the founding religious identity of a school may legitimately be preserved, the modern public
character of the institution must also be recognised.
The school cannot simultaneously say, "This is our Christian institution," when claiming religious privilege and, in
the next breath, say, "This is a public institution," when receiving public resources.
With public funding comes public responsibility.
AND THEN THERE IS SCHOOL PLACEMENT
The argument becomes even stronger when Ghana's school-placement system is considered.
For the overwhelming majority of families seeking admission into the public second-cycle education system, the
question is not simply, "Which religious school do I want my child to attend?"
The Computerised School Selection and Placement System largely determines where a child eventually finds
himself or herself.
A Muslim child may therefore be placed in a historically Christian school.
A Christian child may equally find himself or herself in an institution with an Islamic background.
The child did not necessarily choose the school.
The parents may not have chosen it either.
The State's placement mechanism did.
It would therefore be profoundly unfair to place a child in a school and then tell that child that, because the school
has a particular religious history, he or she must surrender aspects of his or her religious identity.
You cannot compel a person into a religious environment and then punish that person for remaining faithful to his or
her own religion.
WHAT DOES THE CONSTITUTION SAY?
The matter cannot properly be decided merely by shouting "Christian school" or "Muslim student."
Ghana is a constitutional democracy.
Article 17 of the 1992 Constitution establishes the principle of equality before the law and prohibits discrimination
on grounds including religion.
Article 21 further guarantees fundamental freedoms, including freedom of thought, conscience and belief, and the
freedom to practise or manifest one's religion.
These are not privileges granted by a school administrator.
They are constitutional rights.
At the same time, the Constitution does not require Ghana to erase the religious identity of its institutions. Religious
organisations remain free to establish and operate institutions consistent with the law.
The sensible constitutional balance is therefore not difficult to identify:
A Christian school may remain Christian in its historical and institutional identity without requiring every student to
become Christian.
Similarly:
A Muslim school may retain its Islamic identity without requiring every student to become Muslim.
That is what tolerance means.
RELIGIOUS IDENTITY IS NOT RELIGIOUS DOMINATION
There is an important distinction which the present debate sometimes obscures.
A school can teach its history.
It can preserve its traditions.
It can maintain standards of discipline inspired by its founding ethos.
It can hold religious ceremonies appropriate to its institutional identity.
It can even teach students about religion.
But there is a line between exposure to a school's religious tradition and compulsion to participate in religious
worship.
That line should not be difficult for reasonable people to recognise.
If a Muslim student wishes to pray, and that prayer does not disrupt school activities or infringe the rights of others,
why should that student be treated as an intruder?
If a Christian student attends an Islamic institution and wishes to observe a Christian religious obligation in a
reasonable and non-disruptive manner, why should the student be regarded as an enemy of the institution?
The school should teach discipline, not intolerance.
WE MUST BE CAREFUL WHAT WE TEACH OUR CHILDREN
There is an even bigger issue here.
Schools are not merely places where children learn mathematics, English, science and social studies.
They are laboratories in which future citizens learn how to live with one another.
If a Christian child is taught that the Muslim beside him is somehow less deserving of respect because he prays
differently, we have failed as educators.
If a Muslim child is taught that the Christian beside him is an enemy because he worships differently, we have failed
in exactly the same way.
The Ghanaian child must leave school knowing that religious disagreement does not make another Ghanaian an
inferior Ghanaian.
That lesson may ultimately be more important than many of the lessons contained in the textbooks.
THE REAL TEST OF RELIGIOUS TOLERANCE
It is easy to preach tolerance when everyone around us believes what we believe.
The real test comes when someone disagrees with us.
It is easy for a Christian to demand religious freedom when he is among Christians.
It is equally easy for a Muslim to demand religious freedom when surrounded by Muslims.
The real test is whether each is prepared to defend the freedom of the other.
This is where Ghana must be careful.
We should not import into our educational system the kind of religious polarisation that has destroyed communities
elsewhere.
Our children will eventually leave their boarding houses and classrooms and enter the wider Ghanaian society.
They will encounter Muslim doctors, Christian doctors and traditionalist doctors.
They will encounter Muslim police officers, Christian police officers and officers of no particular religious
persuasion.
They will encounter nurses, judges, teachers, soldiers, engineers, pilots, drivers, civil servants and businesspeople
from every conceivable religious background.
And when the emergency comes, nobody asks whether the person arriving in the ambulance is Christian or Muslim.
Nobody asks the religious identity of the firefighter who is running into the burning building.
Nobody asks whether the surgeon about to save a life is praying in Arabic or English.
We trust the human being to do his or her duty.
That is the Ghana we should be educating our children to build.
LET US LOWER THE TEMPERATURE
There is consequently a need for all sides to lower the temperature.
Christian institutions should not regard every Muslim student's request to practise his or her faith as an attack upon
Christianity.
Muslim students should equally understand that entering a Christian mission school carries with it certain
institutional traditions which should be respected, provided those traditions do not violate constitutional rights.
The answer is not to abolish mission schools.
Nor is it to turn every mission school into a religiously neutral institution devoid of history and identity.
The answer is reasonable accommodation.
Schools should establish clear rules which distinguish legitimate institutional activities from compulsory religious
observance.
Students should be allowed reasonable opportunities to practise their faith.
No student should be harassed, humiliated or discriminated against because of his or her religion.
And no religion should be permitted to use institutional power to diminish the constitutional rights of another.
GHANA HAS DONE BETTER THAN THIS
Ghana has spent decades demonstrating that Christians and Muslims can live together without turning every
difference into a war.
We should not allow the relatively manageable issue of mission-school religious practice to become a source of
permanent religious confrontation.
Our Constitution has already given us the broad principles.
Equality.
Freedom of conscience.
Freedom of religion.
Non-discrimination.
Respect for the rights of others.
What remains is the wisdom to apply them.
The Christian should be free to be Christian.
The Muslim should be free to be Muslim.
The traditional believer should be free to practise his or her faith.
And the person who professes no religion should equally be entitled to his or her conscience.
The State's responsibility is not to choose which of these citizens is right.
Its responsibility is to ensure that all of them can live together peacefully and with dignity.
That is the Ghanaian tradition worth defending.
Let the schools retain their histories. Let the churches retain their traditions. Let the mosques retain theirs. But let us
not turn our schools into battlegrounds of religious supremacy.
Let us teach our children something greater than religious conformity: respect for the conscience of another human
being.
And, above all, let us tone down the religious bigotry
(Periscope Depth of 7 th September, 2026).
