The Ambassador Extraordinaire of Ghana Prisons and Executive Director of Crime Check Foundation, CCF, Ibrahim Oppong Kwarteng has commended the Church of Pentecost for its efforts to decongest Ghana’s forty-four prisons through the construction of additional prisons.
Mr. Kwarteng who has been advocating for the passage of a non-Custodial Sentencing law to help decongest the prisons applauded the efforts of the church after it handed over a more than 300-bed-capacity prison at Ejura in the Eastern Region to the Ghana Prisons Service.
“It is one of the magnificent prisons I have seen comparable to Europe and the Americas. I think that is what our prisons should be. The edifice reflects a purely correctional institution.” He told crimecheckghana.
“Prisoners are not supposed to be treated as animals. They are to be treated with the utmost care, have facilities that are not congested and it is believed by some researchers that when criminals are treated with the utmost care and love it goes a long way to reform and rehabilitate them.” He added.
The fully furnished prison has facilities such as a vocational and technical training workshop, a recreational centre, a Church building and baptistery.
It also has a football pitch, state of the art washrooms, mechanized boreholes, offices, infirmary, kitchen, and a dining hall among others.
The Chairman of the Church of Pentecost, Apostle Eric Nyamekye, the Interior Minster, Ambrose Dery and the Chief of Ejura, Barima Osei Hwedie II, jointly commissioned the ultra-modern edifice.
The project forms part of the Church’s Security Based Development Projects captured in its 2023 vision of “possessing the nations” agenda.
Statistics by the Ghana Prisons Service shows that Ghana’s forty-four prisons are overcrowded by 53 percent.
The forty-four prisons are originally meant to hold Nine Thousand inmates but currently houses about Fifteen Thousand.
Under the leadership of Mr. Kwarteng, CCF has paid the fines of many petty offenders.
