The POS Foundation, a human rights civil society organization, has established a fully equipped paralegal office at the Kumasi Central Prison, supported by funding from GIZ.
The commissioning of this facility took place on Friday, April 26, 2024, through collaboration with the Ghana Prisons Service and the Legal Aid Commission to enhance paralegal operations within the prison.
Twenty prison officers and eleven inmates, who underwent training as paralegals under the In-prison Paralegal Program (IPP), will utilize the facility. The IPP aims to complement the Justice For All Program (JFAP) by training convict inmates and prison officers as paralegals to assist prisoners who may have received unjust sentences or miscarriages of justice.
These trained paralegals will provide support to convict prisoners who lack the financial means to hire legal representation, enabling them to appeal their cases for self-representation under Article 19 (2) (f).
With the commissioning of the Ashanti region’s office, in addition to the one in Nsawam, there are now two fully functional paralegal offices nationwide.
The commissioning ceremony was attended by notable figures such as Justice Dennis Adjei, a Judge of the African Court on Human and People’s Rights, and Edmund Foley, Executive Director of the Legal Aid Commission, alongside other prominent justice sector actors.
Jonathan Osei Owusu, Executive Director of the POS Foundation, highlighted the positive impact of the IPP on justice delivery, citing examples such as the case of Ama Forson, a 69-year-old woman who was acquitted and discharged after spending 4 years and 7 months in prison on narcotic charges, thanks to an appeal facilitated through the program.
Additionally, renovations and furnishing of two offices at the Nsawam Medium Security Prison were completed to serve as paralegal offices for trained in-prison paralegals under the IPP.
On the same day, a multi-stakeholder workshop for justice sector actors on access to legal aid, focusing on the in-prison paralegal program, was held in Kumasi. Selected actors gathered to discuss their institutional roles in providing legal aid, identify challenges, and propose solutions to promote justice delivery for prison inmates.
