Prisons boss advocates non-custodial sentences for misdemeanours
The Director-General of Prisons, Ms Matilda Baffour-Awuah, has advocated non-custodial sentences for people convicted of misdemeanours as a way of decongesting the country's prisons.
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She indicated that the increasing incidence of remand cases and people sentenced by the courts daily to serve various prison terms had led to "an overwhelming congestion in the prisons".
Ms Baffour-Awuah made the suggestion in her foreward to the 2012 report of the Ghana Prisons Service (GPS).
She stated that overcrowding in the prisons called for extensive reforms in the sentencing policies of the country to consider other alternatives to imprisonment.
"It is highly envisaged that while committing persons convicted of felonies to prison terms and working out appropriate non-custodial sentences for those convicted of misdemeanours, our prisons will be decongested for effective sentence planning and management," she stated.
Prisoners
According to the report, the average prisoner population for 2012 stood at 13,487, as against 13,396 in 2011.
The figure reflects an annual population increase of 0.7 per cent.
The average daily remand population stood at 3,027, as against 3,042 in the previous year, representing an annual reduction rate of 0.5 per cent.
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The number of remand prisoners constituted 22.4 per cent of the total prisoner population.
The report stated that the GPS remained focused on facilitating and coordinating activities of the Judicial Review Committee, dubbed the ‘Justice for All Programme’, which led to the release of 49 remand prisoners who had outstayed their commitment warrants, while 62 were bailed.
Conviction
The average daily convict population for the reporting year was 10,448, representing an annual convict growth rate of 0.9 per cent.
Of the figure, 10,275, representing 98.3 per cent, were male, while 177, representing 1.7 per cent, were female.
The female to male convicts ratio for the year was 1:58.
Remand population
The daily average remand population for 2012 was 3,027, representing an annual rate of 0.5 per cent.
Of the total remand figure, 2,960, representing 98 per cent, were male, while the remaining two per cent were female.
Out of the daily average inmate population of 13,487, a total of 117 were juveniles.
A total of 304 foreigners were admitted to prison during the reporting year.