Churches urged to pay fines for convicts

Kumasi, Dec. 28, GNA Churches should consider paying fines imposed on convicts by the courts as a means of decongesting the prisons, Mr Ambrose Imoro Salifu, Ashanti Regional Commander of Prisons, has suggested. Mr Salifu said the major problem facing the prisons was the large numbers of remand prisoners, which had overstretched facilities thus compelling inmates to sleep in turns, a situation he described as injurious to their health.

The Regional Prison Commander was speaking when the Most Reverend Peter Kwasi Sarpong, Catholic Archbishop of Kumasi, paid his 36th annual visit to the Kumasi Central Prisons on Boxing Day to share the word of God with the inmates and the prison officials. Mr Salifu explained that some of the inmates were in the prisons just because they were unable to pay minor fines imposed on them by the courts and if churches paid such fines it would help to decongest the prisons. He commended the Catholic Church for its regular support to prisons in the Ashanti Region and appealed to the Government to increase the feeding allowance of 4,000 cedis per day for every inmate.

Most Reverend Sarpong appealed to the Government to grant mass amnesty to some prisoners in the country to mark the 50th anniversary of Ghana's independence. He explained that such a gesture would not only decongest the nation's overcrowded prisons but would also reconcile the nation as well as heal the wounds of affected families.

Archbishop Sarpong called on the inmates not to see themselves as outcasts, who have come to the end of the road but to use their period of incarceration to take stock of their lives; forgive themselves and to plan towards life after serving their jail terms. He commended the prison authorities for allowing him to adopt the prisons in the Region ever since he became Bishop, which had enabled him to preach and interact with the inmates.

The Most Rev Gabriel Justice Anokye, the Auxiliary Bishop of the Archdiocese, preaching the sermon, called on Christians to pray for both the inmates and the prison personnel to enable them to work and live peacefully. He lamented over the increasing spate of injustices in the country as a result of some law enforcing agencies not doing the right thing which in turn sent some innocent people into prison. Bishop Anokye appealed to the society to avoid condemning people in prison custody since as he put it, not all of them have committed crimes, as some were thrown into jail due to false accusations.