The government has been called upon to expand the Legal Aid delivery system to cover all the districts in the country to enable poor rural folks to access justice through the scheme.
The Director of the Legal Aid Scheme, Mr Al-hassan Yahaya Seini, who made the call at the launch of the Legal Aid Week in Accra Tuesday, said the Legal Aid Scheme Act and the Ghana Shared Growth and Development Agenda (GSDA) required the Legal Aid Board to see to the delivery of legal aid throughout the country, including districts.
Unfortunately, he said, the Legal Aid Board had only a minimal presence in the regional capitals and none at all in the districts.
The celebration of the week, which starts from October 3 to 7, 2011, is on the theme, “Empowering the vulnerable in society through Legal Aid”.
Mr Seini called for the implementation of the plans under the GSDA and the establishment of offices in the districts with staff and equipment to enhance the work of the scheme.
The plans under the GSDA, he said, should include mainstreaming Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) mechanism in legal aid delivery, reviewing the Legal Aid Act, 1997, Act 542, and creating a directorate of public defenders and a citizens’ advisory bureau.
He said currently, the Legal Aid Scheme had 14 lawyers, with none in the Upper East and Upper West regions, as well as 18 mediators serving the scheme to provide for the justice needs of all the people in the country.
He noted that justice was not the preserve of the urban population, noting that given the general understanding that the average person living in the rural was poor, the need to establish structures for delivery of legal aid services to the rural poor was overwhelmingly important.
Mr Seini said records indicated that of the over 24 million people living in the country, less than 5,000 were lawyers, with most of them located in Accra, Kumasi and Sekondi/Takoradi.
He said the number of lawyers included those on the Bench, the Bar and non-practitioners, making it a challenge to deliver legal aid to the rural poor.
He said the evolution of alternative means of resolving disputes, which had attained statutory status in the ADR Law, provided a greater opportunity for establishing a system of paralegals in their public and private services without further delay.
Mr Seini said the scheme lacked equipment and other logistics such as computers and vehicles to carry on its operations smoothly.
He said there was inadequate financial and material provision and support for the scheme, adding that very few legal practitioners were offering their services to support and strengthen the work of the scheme as required.
Mr Seini said despite those challenges, the scheme handled an increasing number of cases between 2007 and 2010, noting that there was an ongoing discussion to raise funds and secure an increase in the budgetary allocation to the scheme.
He said there had also been consultations with non-state agencies for financial and logistical support to the scheme.
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