A day’s workshop has been held in the Ketu South Municipality of the Volta region to strengthen key institutions responsible for justice delivery so as to improve the country’s justice delivery system. It was put together by the Legal Resources Center (LRC).
The national programmes Officer for the Legal Resources Center, Robert Tettey Nomo Jnr, explained that the workshop aims to expand access to Justice, by making more educational appeal and advocacy.
He said the center identified some difficulties and is making real the policies that will ensure access to justice for all.
“Access to justice is also part of critical efforts to root out racial inequities in the justice system because some people suffer disproportionately from the justice system’s maltreatment of disadvantaged litigants.
According to him, the goal is to make it easier for people to learn about their rights, assert their rights, obtain fair decisions, and enforce those decisions when it becomes crimes by law.
“Our advocacy is to improve justice system policies that makes a difference, so that people would have an understanding of their legal rights and ability to pursue their case, knowing the principles of justice in a criminal plea and sentence, or that concerns other kinds of life problems that intersect with the law.
“For instance, most people are not aware that unless you resist arrest unnecessarily, the police do not have the right to use any force in effecting your arrest,” he said.
Robert Tettey therefore tasked the participants to promote legal awareness, adding that, for the populations to access justice, they must understand their rights and the means for claiming them. He said most people in a war-torn state, see the laws and the formal justice system as alien institutions which they fear and do not understand how to go about it.
By Hebrews pouyeli Kumako || Volta Forum
