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CLAIM : Social media posts circulating widely in Ghana, including from pages such as Trends GH, Africa Global News, and GF Icon, assert that a bill before Parliament would make DNA testing compulsory for all children born in Ghana. The posts suggest that DNA testing is being mandated as a blanket legal requirement under that legislation.
VERDICT: FALSE. Checks by DUBAWA suggest that the Paternity Fraud (Criminalisation) Bill, 2026, contains no provision mandating DNA testing for any child born in Ghana. The bill’s own sponsor, Gomoa Central MP Kwame Asare Obeng, has said, “I am advocating for the criminalisation of paternity fraud, not mandatory paternity testing.”
FULL TEXT
Gomoa Central MP Kwame Asare Obeng, popularly known as A Plus, announced in February 2026 that he was preparing to introduce a Private Member’s Bill in Parliament to criminalise paternity fraud in Ghana. The MP emphasised that the proposed legislation had already been drafted and would soon be formally presented before Parliament.
Supporters of the bill also suggested the introduction of mandatory DNA testing after childbirth to establish paternity and prevent future disputes — a position that gained traction in public commentary and online discourse accompanying the announcement.
It is those early public statements, rather than the bill’s actual text or the position of its sponsor, that appear to be driving the social media claims under review. DUBAWA Ghana reviewed the Paternity Fraud (Criminalisation) Bill, 2026, to establish what the draft legislation actually provides.
For instance, social media pages including Trends GH, Africa Global News, and GF Icon, have been inundated with the claims of mandatory paternity tests, which have since triggered lots of responses.
Due to the claims’ controversial nature and the risk of misinformation, DUBAWA decided to investigate them.
Verification
A thorough review of the Paternity Fraud (Criminalisation) Bill, 2026, by DUBAWA indicates that the bill makes no provision for compulsory DNA testing of all children born in Ghana.
Under Section 20, which addresses the rights of the putative father defined in the bill as a man alleged or believed to be the biological father of a child but whose paternity has not been legally determined, the bill grants such a man the right to seek a court order for DNA testing to determine his biological relationship to the child. This is a discretionary legal remedy available upon application to a court. It is not a blanket mandate applied to all births.
A screenshot of sections 19-20 of the draft bill
The bill does not require DNA testing as a precondition for birth registration. It does not impose any obligation on hospitals or maternity facilities to conduct paternity tests before discharging newborns. No such provision appears anywhere in its text.
The bill’s interpretation section defines “DNA test” as a scientific test conducted by an accredited laboratory on biological samples to establish or exclude biological paternity. The inclusion of that definition is standard legislative drafting practice and, on its own, does not introduce any testing requirement.
A screenshot of the interpretation section of the draft bill
The sponsor’s own clarification
In an interview with a local media outlet, Asempa FM, A Plus addressed the confusion directly.
“Paternity fraud should be criminalised. My bill seeks to combat paternity fraud and enhance parental accountability. I am advocating for the criminalisation of paternity fraud, not mandatory paternity testing,” he said.
What the bill does instead
The bill’s primary purpose is to criminalise deliberate or reckless misrepresentation of a child’s biological paternity.
Under Section 5, a person commits the offence of paternity fraud where, with intent or recklessness, they represent to another person or to an authority that a specified man is the biological father of a child, knowing or being reckless as to whether that representation is false.
Intentional commission attracts a term of up to 5 years’ imprisonment, a fine not exceeding GHS 50,000, or both. Reckless commission attracts a fine of up to three years or a fine not exceeding GHS 25,000, or both.
A section of the offences related to paternity fraud
The bill builds in explicit legal defences. Where an accused genuinely and reasonably believed the representation to be true at the time it was made, and received no financial or material benefit from it, no offence is committed under Section 5. Section 21 reinforces this further: nothing in the Act shall be construed to criminalise a woman solely on account of uncertainty about paternity where she had a genuine belief as to the identity of the biological father. The prosecution must, in all cases, establish beyond a reasonable doubt that the accused acted with intent or recklessness as defined in the Act.
The bill’s rights framework
Part V of the bill, titled “Protection of Rights,” explicitly states that a determination of paternity under the Act shall not operate to render a child illegitimate or to remove any right the child had acquired before such determination. The bill also affirms that every child has the right to know their biological parentage and to receive financial support from their biological parents — framed as protections for the child, not as premises for compulsory population-wide testing.
Conclusion
The claim that Ghana’s Paternity Fraud (Criminalisation) Bill, 2026, makes DNA testing compulsory is FALSE. The bill contains no such provision, and the MP sponsoring it has explicitly stated he is advocating for the criminalisation of paternity fraud, not mandatory paternity testing.
The bill criminalises the deliberate or reckless misrepresentation of a child’s biological paternity, with explicit legal defences built in for honest mistake and genuine uncertainty.
