A legislative proposal now advancing in Ghana would impose compulsory DNA paternity testing on every child born in a healthcare facility and criminalise what its sponsors call “paternity fraud".

Proponents present the measure as a simple quest for biological certainty and paternal protection.

Her Ladyship Justice Sedinam Awo Kwadam has rightly condemned it. The bill is not a neutral search for truth. It is a discriminatory, legally incoherent and morally corrosive instrument that would inject state-mandated suspicion into the moment of birth.

The proposal fails on several fundamental legal grounds.

First, it is structurally discriminatory. It demands proof of paternity while treating maternity as presumptively unquestionable. This is not gender-neutral policy; it is a legislative presumption that mothers alone must demonstrate fidelity. No comparable regime exists for questioning maternity. Such selectivity reveals the bill’s true character: not the pursuit of scientific fact, but the institutionalisation of distrust directed at women.

Second, the bill erases the critical distinction between innocent error, rare genetic anomaly and deliberate deception. A DNA mismatch does not automatically constitute fraud. Biology is complex; human relationships are more so. By treating every exclusion as presumptive evidence of criminality, the proposal revives the logic of trial by ordeal — where an adverse result alone proves guilt — rather than modern principles of intent and proof.

Third, the bill is unnecessary. Ghana already possesses a coherent, child-centred legal framework for determining parentage. Section 32 of the Evidence Act, 1975 (NRCD 323), Sections 40 to 42 of the Children’s Act, 1998 (Act 560, as amended), and Section 47(1)(f) of the Courts Act, 1993 (Act 459, as amended) provide established, judicially supervised mechanisms for resolving genuine disputes. These statutes rightly place the best interests of the child at the centre. Compulsory testing at birth would disrupt this framework without justification.

Men who harbour sincere doubts about paternity already have access to private DNA testing and the courts. The bill does not expand access to truth; it compels every mother to prove her sexual exclusivity at the hospital door. As Justice Kwadam aptly observes, this is less a “paternity fraud” bill than a “proof of fidelity at birth” bill.

The economic and practical objections are equally damning. As a private member’s bill, it cannot lawfully draw on the Consolidated Fund. Shifting the cost to new parents — already facing hospital and postnatal expenses — would be both absurd and regressive. The state would be forcing families to finance their own vindication against a presumption of maternal deceit.

Ghana can and must do better. Families deserve policies grounded in trust, due process and the rule of law, not blanket suspicion and coercion. The legislature should reject this proposal outright. Truth in parentage is best served not by mandatory testing at birth, but by a legal system that respects evidence, protects children and treats mothers and fathers with equal dignity.

By: Amanda Akuokor Clinton, Esq.

Amanda Akuokor Clinton is a Ghanaian lawyer and policy analyst specialising in family and constitutional law.