Three hundred remand prisoners are still being held at the Nsawam Medium Security Prison, even though their warrants have expired, an Executive Director of the Centre for Human Rights and Civil Liberties (CHURCIL), Mr. Kojo Graham, has disclosed. At a meeting for stakeholders on the Justice For All Project organized by the Ministry of Justice and the Attorney-General's Department in Accra last Monday, Mr. Graham said the continued stay of the accused persons in prison was illegal because their warrants had not been renewed. He told the Daily Graphic that the expiration of the remand warrants meant that those remand prisoners were being kept illegally unless the court renewed warrants for their continued detention. The prison authorities, on the other hand, cannot release the remand prisoners because they have not received any court orders to that effect. Mr. Graham further explained that the courts could only renew the warrants if the remand prisoners were put before them by the police. In addition to those whose warrants had expired, he said, the dockets on 600 prisoners, including the 300 at the same prison, could not be traced when officials of the centre conducted a six-month check on remand prisoners at Nsawam. The Justice For All Project is an initiative of the Ministry of Justice and Attorney-General's Department and is aimed at bringing justice to the doorstep of all citizens, especially the vulnerable in the society. The meeting, which was attended by the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, Mr. Joe Ghartey, his deputy, Mr. Osei Kwame Prempeh, representatives from the Ghana Prisons Service, the Ghana Police Service and the Judicial Service, was aimed at reviewing the progress, challenges and the way forward for the project. Other stakeholders at the meeting included officials from the Attorney-General’s Department, the President of the Ghana Bar Association (GBA), Nii Osah Mills, representatives from Legal Aid Board, the Ministry of Women and Children's Affairs (MOWAC), the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), among other stakeholders. According to Mr. Graham, it also came to light during the inspection that 40 of the remand prisoners had been on remand for between six and 14 years. He said it was unfortunate that the documents on the said remand prisoners could not be traced by officials of CHURCIL who were working in collaboration with the Ministry of Justice and the Attorney-General's Department, the judiciary and other stakeholders to ensure the effective administration of justice to all Ghanaians. Mr. Graham, therefore, called for a review of the system, by which the contact addresses of remand prisoners, as well as the police stations where they were remanded and the name of the judge, who remanded them, would be provided. He said there was also the need for the name of the investigator of the case, the nature of the offence, among other relevant information, to be provided for effective follow-ups on remand cases. According to Mr. Graham, it also came to light that there were not more than 10 prosecutors handling criminal cases at the Cocoa Affairs Court in Accra where a chunk of the remand prisoners emanated from, adding that there was, therefore, the need for the development of a database from which all cases could be tracked. He said apart from the initiative to give freedom to deserving remand prisoners, special courts must be set up to handle the backlog of remand prisoners at the country's prisons. Another Executive Director of CHURCIL, Mr. Andrew Daniels, explained further that the remand prisoners were being held in contravention of Article 14 of the 1992 Constitution. He said more remand prisoners were being interviewed and noted that the number might exceed the 600 on completion of the project. He said under the project, remand prisoners who were already in the prisons and those who were remanded daily were being monitored. According to him, the project was aimed at coming up with mechanisms to decongest the prisons, adding that majority of those remand prisoners were being held for basic offences like theft and assault. He called for an effective system for the monitoring of dockets on prisoners, adding that the system which put accused persons at the mercy of the availability or otherwise of dockets should be a thing of the past.