The Crime Check Foundation (CCF), crime prevention advocacy organisation, has launched another initiative dubbed “Decriminalising Vagrancy Laws and Advocacy” (DVLA) Project.
Funded by the Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA), the Project is to vigorously implement the decision of the African Court on Human and People’s Rights which held that vagrancy laws mainly tend to affect the poor and it contravene the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights and other international Human Rights Instruments that Ghana has ratified.
The Court went on to define Vagrancy Laws as laws which criminalise the status of individuals as being poor or unemployed as opposed to specific reprehensible acts.
The Executive Director of Crime Check Foundation, Ibrahim Oppong Kwarteng, said the work of the foundation has provided a rare opportunity to better appreciate poverty, which is the key reason many Ghanaians find themselves in jail. This is because most of the people cannot afford to pay for counsel, fines and fees.
He said Ghana’s justice delivery system appears to affect the poor who constitute the majority of the citizens who are caught on the wrong side of the law. “Many of the poor people adversely affected by these vagrant laws are persons who engage in petty economic activities for their survival.”
It is for this reason that 12 Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies have been selected for the implementation of the project. This is because most of the vagrant laws are the bye-laws of the assemblies, which are to provide places or venues for these people to ply their trade but do not do it.
Mr. Oppong Kwarteng hinted, “some of the MMDAs the foundation has already engaged have admitted to the need to review some of the laws in the quest to reduce their harsh effects on ordinary citizens.”
He, however, said, “but the desired success can only be achieved through the collective efforts and collaboration of all.”
A lecturer at the Department of Political Science, University of Education, Winneba, George Asekere, said the bye-laws of the assemblies in principle are good to ensure sanity but should not be used to criminalise poverty. He said, “I believe the Decriminalising Vagrancy Laws and Advocacy (DVLA) project provides the solution because it will help educate vagrants to know and exercise their rights and responsibilities.”
He said, “the reform we hope to see with this project should include MMDAs to play their part by providing the enabling environment for vagrants to work.”
A former Director of the Institute of Local Government Studies, Dr. Esther Offei Aboagye, who launched the project, said she was delighted to be associated with the DVLA project. This is because it is going to work with the MMDAs and by extension the Regional Co-ordinating Councils saying “It is imperative that we help local authorities in their quest to clarify their social agenda, especially, that they are the levels of government that most people in their day-to-day lives come into contact with”.
Justice of the Court of Appeal, Rosetta Bernasco Essah, who represented the Chief Justice, said she has taken judicial notice of the issues raised concerning vagrancy laws and will equally report to her boss for the necessary reforms to be undertaken.
The Crime Check Foundation intends to work collaboratively with the country’s justice delivery institutions, MMDAs and the media to achieve the overall objective of Decriminalising Vagrancy Laws through advocacy.
It is also in line with the CCF‘s advocacy campaigns for the passage of the non-custodial sentencing to help reduce congestions in the prisons.
Story by: Seth Kojo Eyiah
