State Institutions mandated by law to administer justice in the criminal justice system have been urged to expedite actions in their work to help avoid excessive delay of cases and provide quick response to suspect and accused persons for effective delivery of justice in the country.

At a discussion forum organised by Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative in Accra, stakeholders, civil society groups and participants shared their perspectives on the delay of cases and criminal administration system in Ghana.

Speaking in an interview with a section of journalists on the theme "Excessive delay of cases and prolonged Pre-trial Detentions at the programme, the Head of Department of public Law at the GIMPA Law Faculty, Mr. Edmund Amarkwei Foley urged state Institutions vested with powers to administer justice to be swift in providing responses when cases are reported as a delay has the tendency to affect suspected victims and criminal justice administration in the country. He said "Get them a quick response, if advice delays, if prosecution delays it can affect evidence and also affect the mood of the victim".
He added that quick responses and actions would also help address remand populations in the prisons. "Looking at our remand population, if the accused person doesn't get bail, they are remanded in prison custody and that adds on to the remand population and so the turn around time in the criminal justice system should be worked on to avoid longer hours in detention". he noted.

Mr. Amarkwei Foley however indicated that despite plans by institutions like the Attorney Generals Department and the Ghana Police service to roll out an electronic system to track dockets and cases, very little has been heard about it.

He therefore appealed to Policy makers and institutions working on the system to pilot the tracking mechanism at the stations where data are available and provide them feed back on how the system works.

A representative from the Prosecution Division of the Attorney Generals Department, Madam Esi Dentaa Yankah, on her part said that even though dockets received by her outfit should be worked on within a maximum period of a month as the standard operating procedure, they are unable to do so due to some challenges such as resource constraints, bureaucracy, inadequate staff among others.

She added that apart from their regular routine job, they also perform additional task which sometimes also causes delay.

When asked if some cases are given priority than others. she said no and that all cases are given equal provided there are no challenges with it.

A supretendent of the Legal Department of the Ghana Police Service (CID), Madam Elizabeth Viney also shared with participants some of the problems that has contributed to the excessive delay of cases " there are so many levels involved on a single case, numerous petitions received, lack of prosecutors and lack of personnel.

According to her, they have made some request to government for assistance and are also working closely with the Attorney Generals Department to help address some of them.

Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative shared their perspectives and findings on transmission of Dockets from the police stations to the Attorney Generals Department.

According to the report, out of the 14 police stations monitored, only 8 provided responses. Out of 42 dockets, 29 had received advice from the AG's Department between January and June 2018.

According to the report cases such as assault received 5 feedback out of 7 cases received, 1 case of causing harm received a feed back.

Again, out of 3 theft cases recorded, 1 feedback was provided.

They disclosed that the time span for various responses to the cases ranged between 1- 2 months, 3- 4 months and 5- 6 months.

By: Ebenezer Kofi Amponsah