Days 2 and 3: the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice

I spent yesterday and today at the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ).  This organisation, according to its most recent annual report, “exists to protect fundamental human rights and to promote good governance in Ghana”.  It has a mandate to act in three areas: human rights; administrative justice; and anti-corruption.  Its activity within these areas falls into two main categories: firstly, the investigation and resolution of complaints and secondly, public education.

On Wednesday morning I was taken to court.  I watched, among other matters, a couple of applications for bail: the main differences from applications for bail in courts at home (or what I have learnt of them on the BPTC – not necessarily the same thing) were firstly, the complete absence of a prosecutor and secondly, a greater emphasis on the facts of the case itself, rather than just the circumstances of the defendant.  I also watched the judge deal unsympathetically with an absent party: “he is caught up in traffic? I am caught up in malaria fever and I am still here!”

The rest of Wednesday and all of Thursday were spent in the Complaints Unit.  This department receives all incoming cases.  These will be either written down by the complainant himself or by a member of the Complaints Unit who interviews the complainant.  It is then decided at a meeting whether or not the complaint will be accepted.  The main difficulty faced by this department is not an excess of cases: rather, it is that many of the problems they receive cannot be taken on because of the limits placed by CHRAJ’s constitution on admissible complaints.  The main criterion is that cases must fall within one of the three mandates, but in addition cases cannot be accepted if, for example, it is against an international organisation, or has not been brought within a year, or is a criminal matter.    

The types of cases received by CHRAJ vary widely: common topics are child maintenance and/or custody, employment disputes, discrimination, education, false imprisonment, and fraud.  CHRAJ also receives a number of more unusual complaints, such as from women accused of witchcraft.  I was told by the head of the Complaints Unit of the existence in Ghana of “witch camps”: camps where women accused of being witches live, ostracised from their communities and maintained largely by NGOs.  Apparently there are 3 or 4 such in the country.

The lessons learnt from CHRAJ, however, were not only of a legal nature: I was also taught by a friendly employee how to use a tro-tro.  Tro-tros (tro-troes?) constitute Accra’s public transport system: rickety minibuses that follow mysterious routes and pick up passengers in a manner incomprehensible to the uninitiated.  Unfortunately, I doubt the knowledge I have acquired will be of general application, as each tro-tro seems to obey its own rules: but I do at least now know how to get from CHRAJ to where I am staying for 23 pence.