A Human Rights Lawyer is accusing the police administration of deliberately sabotaging the Justice For All Programme.

Francis Sosu-Xavier said the programme has largely exposed the "ineptitude" of some police detectives who have failed to carry out thorough investigations on cases assigned to them and have left such victims to rot in jail.

His comments come shortly after eight remand prisoners were reported missing from the Akuse prisons in the Eastern Region.

The eight were part of 23 other suspects whose cases were to be attended to under the Justice For All programme.

Two justices, CJ Honyenuga and CK Hometowu were surprised the authorities could not explain the whereabouts of the eight  and ordered an investigation to be carried out.

But Lawyer Sosu-Xavier who has been instrumental in the Justice for All Programme, suspects the police may have a hand in the disappearance of the inmates.

"If you take eight out of 23 that is a very huge percentage of those inmates. The question is that why were they not available. Why was it the case that after they had been listed for the Justice For All programme their investigators quickly came for them. Where were they taken. Were they taken to court?" he demanded to know.

"These are questions the police need to answer. Otherwise I think it is unfair and inappropriate that a committee will sit down and shortlist all these people and judges prepare and come to prison to sit on the cases  just to be told the inmates are not available," he protested in an interview with Myjoyonline.com.

Francis Sosu-Xavier said it was not the first time inmates have gone missing at the country's prisons anytime the Justice For All programme was set to sit in a particular prison.

"Before the team gets to the  prison which has been selected you would often see that some of the inmates that have been selected to be part of the justice for all programme are not available," he alleged.

Even though he admitted some of the inmates may legitimately have been taken to court, he was quick to add that in many instances "police investigators deliberately come quickly to get them so they will not take part in the Justice For all programme."

He is convinced there is a bigger plot by the police to sabotage the programme because it exposes their shoddy investigations.

"The Justice For All Programme has exposed police ineptitude and poor investigations that police officers are paid to do because to keep somebody on remand for three, four, five years without trial [is inhuman]."

According to him, there are instances where the police have held press conferences to announce that it has arrested some criminals and named some of those criminal suspects as beneficiaries of the Justice For All programme only for him to investigate and find out later that those suspects were never part of persons freed by the programme.

"The police are not committed to the Justice For All programme and are out there to discredit the programme," he stated.

When Myjoyonline.com contacted the police for a reaction the Director of Police Public Affairs DCOP Ampah-Bennin said he is unaware of any such plot by the police to undermine the programme.

He offered to investigate the matter and comment later.

Listen to the interview