The Minister for the Interior, Muntaka Mohammed-Mubarak, has raised concerns over what he describes as the widespread abuse of remand procedures by both the police and the courts.

He said in some instances, bail conditions imposed by the courts are excessively stringent, making it difficult for accused persons to meet them.

Speaking on the floor of Parliament on Thursday, May 28, Mr. Muntaka indicated that the passage of the Community Service Bill would help address the challenge, reduce overreliance on remand, and ease congestion in prisons and police cells.

“I’ve been working with the Minister of Justice and Attorney General, Dr. Dominic Ayine, on the constitutional amendment that is currently ongoing, that we should make remand very restrictive because currently it is massively abused. With the least provocation, they say they’ve remanded somebody. You go to the police, and they remand people anyhow,” he said.

He added: “Sometimes they give terrible bail conditions that people are not able to meet. We want to take the opportunity in this constitutional amendment to restrict this unnecessary remand. I’m sure that if we’re able to get these three things working together, it is going to help us to decongest our prisons and also ourselves and make life a little better.”

Mr. Muntaka also disclosed that about GH¢40 million is spent annually on feeding prison inmates, describing the amount as woefully inadequate.