Female prisoners appeal for help

Spread Sat. march 29/08

Story Rebecca Quaicoe Duho
FEMALE prisoners at the Nsawam Medium Security are appealing for legal aid services since they cannot afford to hire private legal practitioners.
According to the inmates, most of them qualified to make appeals but because they could not afford the services of lawyers, they were compelled to serve their full term in the prison.
The inmates made the appeal when the Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mrs Oboshie Sai Cofie, paid a working visit to the prison on Thursday to let the inmates know some of the policies that had been put in place by the government to benefit especially women, as well as to observe International Women’s Month which falls in March every year.
A spokeswoman for the inmates said legal aid, the legal assistance given to people who could not afford to pay for lawyers from their own resources, had for a long time been non-existent in the prison. 
She said most of them had been in the prison for a long time and their children were becoming wayward, saying, “I came here as a young girl and I have spent all my prime time here.”
They also appealed for more amnesty to be extended to them and also a system to be put in place whereby prisoners incarcerated during the tribunal period would be able to go in for appeals.
According to them, those who were jailed by the tribunal system which was phased out about 15 years ago had no means of appealing for their cases to be looked into because the system did not exist any longer.
They said most often when such convicts were taken to court for appeal, they were turned back because there were no legal systems in place to hear their cases.
They also called for a support scheme dubbed, “Half way home”, whereby when prisoners were released after serving their jail terms, they were given money to start an economic venture to be able to support themselves financially.
According to them, because such systems were not in place, most ex-convicts found their way back to the prisons because they were not properly integrated into society.
The minister, addressing the inmates, said the government had put in place numerous programmes that would benefit them when they came out.
She mentioned the School Feeding Programme, the National Health Insurance Scheme and credit schemes being offered to women through some ministries.
She said there was a bright future for them when they came out and so they should hope for the better in life.
An Assistant Director of Prisons in charge of the Nsawam Female Prisons, Madam Charity Araba Magnusen, who welcomed the minister and her entourage, enumerated some of the problems that they faced, including the lack of modern equipment to train inmates in skills development, as well as dilapidated beds which she said were causing health problems for most inmates.
She said currently the 200-capacity prison had 113 inmates, made up of 73 convicts, 24 remands, three condemned, three on trial, with one nursing mother and two pregnant women.
The minister later presented feminine necessities such as sanitary pads and toilet rolls, as well as baby food and soap, to the inmates, after which they also handed her a parcel made up of some of the produce of the inmates.
She later visited the Rural Women’s Skills and Development Foundation, also at Nsawam, and the Amasaman chief’s palace.