The facilitators of the "Justice For All Program" (JFAP) organized a training/orientation with some prison officers and inmates to ensure that they are protected from the virus , Covid 19. The orientation was held at the Tarkwa Local Priosns in the Western North Region of Ghana on 23rd February, 2022.
The team considered the need for collective efforts to be made by stakeholders towards ensuring that the spread of the virus is contained. Therefore, an orientation/training session was held for selected Prison Officers and Prisoners on the virus and discussed the steps being taken and way forward in ensuring that they are protected from the virus even though no Covid- 19 case have been recorded in the prisons so far across the country.
Mr Jonathan Osei Owusu, the Executive Director of POS Foundation admonished the prison officers to maintain the record. He said " You have set the record. If you relax and covid gets in, the whole prison will be affected. Almost one and a half years officers and inmates have done this work and has maintained the record"
The orientation also came with a donation by the team to the prison officers and inmates. This was the main reason for the visit. The items included personal Protectives Equipments such as nose masks, hand sanitizers, liquid soaps, veronica buckets, medication and food items. This donation was made possible with support from the Covid-19 Grassroot Justice Fund.
The representative of the assistant Director General of Prisons, Supretendant Francis Dotsey, upon receiving the items thanked the Pos Foundation for the donated items. He indicated that, the advent of the covid enabled them to manage the prisons which has made it possible for them to record no covid 19 case yet. He added that, "as you all know, COVID started about a year ago and as rightly said, we managed the system in such a way that we did not record any case in the in the prison ; so as you are here today to support us, we will use it to the benefit to the prisoners as we have done before to maintain the system up till now. So I thank you so much on behalf of prisons and the director General of prions, thank you very much".
During an interview with the media, the Executive Director of POS Foundation, Jonathan Osie Owusu pleaded with the president and the government to consider granting amnesty for non violent drug users.
"We are pleading with the president of Ghana, to reconsider the crateria for amnesty to include non- violent drug users onto amnesty crateria, particularly with the coming to force with the narcortis commission act, act 1019, 2022. May the president have mercy to ask these people or to grant pardon to these people to decongest our over crowding prisons which is a way to also help should covid-19 get into our prisons, the impact will be minimized, thank you."
The POS Foundation is a human rights civil society organization, responsible for the facilitation the "Justice For All Program" which provides legal services to remand prisoners who cannot afford the services of a lawyer to aid speedy trial in Ghana.
