A legal practitioner called for complaints unit

Koforidua, Dec.23, GNA- Nene Amegacher, an Accra based legal practitioner has called for the setting up of a complaints units throughout the country to receive complaints against members of the police who infringe on the rights of the citizens in the course of their duty.

He explained that, such a unit would enable citizens whose rights have been abused by the police to seek administrative redress to help check such activities of the police.

According to Nene Amegacher, he has observed over the years that the police abused the rights of many poor people especially if it involves criminal cases.

Nene Amegacher who was one of the speakers at the Chief Justice's forum held at Koforidua recently, observed that, even though, such abuses at the police stations occur regularly, there had not been any official directive to address it.

He said Justice delivery could only be accessible to all in the society, when the citizenry were guaranteed of their rights by the law enforcement agencies.

He cited a case in which some people were arrested on a Friday and kept in cells through the weekend with the excuse that they could not be granted bail on weekends.

Nene Amegacher said there were many impediments on the way of the citizenry in accessing justice and urged the Chief Justice to endeavor to use his good office to address the anomaly for the public to have confidence in the justice delivery system.

He suggested that fees payable in the courts be displayed boldly on the walls of the institution for the users of the facility to know the fee structure for each service.

This, he explained would eliminate corruption on the part of some court officials who cheat on litigants due to their lack of knowledge of the fee structure in the courts.

Nene Amegacher, among other things, proposed a comprehensive review of the Legal AID scheme, to enable the Ghana Bar Association (GBA) to play a more proactive role.

On the Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR), he called on the Chief Justice to institute a mid-term break of the judiciary, to enable all lawyers and judges to participate fully in the settlement of cases through the ADR. 23 Dec 06