The Director-General of the Ghana Prison Service, Mr. W.K. Asiedu and members of the Prison Service Council on Thursday, 29th November, 2007, took a team of newsmen on a tour of a new Prison facility being constructed at Ankaful in the Central region as part of government efforts to expand the prisons.

Newsmen were also conducted round another expansion project at Awutu.

Briefing the media, Mr. W.K. Asiedu said that the new Ankaful prison is to be classified as “a Maximum Security Prison”.

The Director General expressed satisfaction at the progress of work on the new prisons at the “Maximum Prison” and expressed the hope that the project would be handed over to the Prison Service Council on the scheduled date.

“I am very happy about the progress of work here, and I hope Barry’s Limited (the local contractor executing the project) would hand over the buildings to the Prison Council on the scheduled date which is July, 2007,” he enthused.

According to the Ghana Prisons D-G, the Ankaful Maximum is being constructed purposely to house long-term convicts.

He outline that on completion, the prison would boast of workshops, classroom blocks, an infirmary, a football field, and a biogas plant which will be used to generate electricity for the prison.

The D-G further outlined that inmates at the Ankaful Maximum Prison would have options to undergo training in various technical subjects and be made to write exams under City and Guild and NVTI at the end of their courses, with all expenses being borne by the Ghana Prison Service in partnership with Prison Service Council.

The training programme, according to the D-G, is aimed at giving would-be inmate employable skills that would make it possible for them to become easily reintegrated into society after serving their sentences such that they would not feel like outcasts and continue with their lives of crime.

This, he noted, would largely reduce the crime rate in the country and equip the outgoing inmates with some knowledge and skills that will make them responsible and profitable to the nation after serving their term.

Mr. Gabriel Selormey of the CSIR, which is responsible for the biogas construction, told media men that on completion, the prison’s capacity to generate electricity through biogas-generation would greatly ease Prison Service of the burden of footing huge electricity bills.

He said, “work on the biogas-electricity generation capability has commenced and will be completed in line with the main prison block as scheduled.”

A representative of the contactors executing the works on the ultra modern Maximum prison, Barry’s Company Limited, also assured the media that works on the Ankaful Maximum Prison is 70% complete and would be handed over to the Prison Service by July next year.

Meanwhile, a two newly constructed dormitories were inaugurated at the Awutu Camp Prison by the Director-General of Ghana Prison Service, Mr. W.K. Asiedu and Mr. Samuel Asubonteng of the Prison Service Council.

The Awutu Camp Prison, which was built in 1982 to house inmates who have just some few months to complete their prison term, now houses 165 inmates with 25 officers overseeing them.

The Awutu Camp Prison under the auspices of the Prison Agriculture Development Fund (PADF) has instituted Agric training programme in food crop, livestock and poultry production for inmates at the Awutu Camp Prison. Speaking to some of the inmates on the Agriculture training programme, the inmates thanked the Prison Service for helping them to acquire different skills while serving their term.

”I thank the Prison Service for introducing me into livestock rearing am hopeful that the skill I have acquired in this field will help me after my term,” one of the inmates told the media.

Some of the inmates spoke against the perception on prisoners that every convict is a criminal.

Emmanuel Doku, a dormitory leader at the Awutu Camp Prison said “I want to dispel the belief that every convict is a criminal and cannot be useful in the country. We are all not criminals; some of us are victims of circumstances and can live peacefully with any other Ghanaian after our terms so I want to tell Ghanaians to give us the due respect when we come home”.