The General Secretary of Church of Pentecost (COP), Apostle Alexander Nana Yaw Kumi Larbi, has hinted that aside from the prison the church built at Ejura, it intends to build four more facilities for the Ghana Prisons Service.

According to him, the Ejura facility is one out of the five projects the church is executing to help decongest the already packed prisons, expressing hope that two others will be completed by the end of this year.

The Church of Pentecost built and donated a prison infrastructure to the Ghana Prisons Service at Ejura in the Ashanti Region.

The fully furnished facility has three dormitory blocks with the capacity to accommodate 300 inmates.

It has an administration block, a chapel which will serve as a classroom, a football pitch, baptistery, modern washrooms, mechanized boreholes, offices, infirmary, workshops and other auxiliary facilities.

Speaking on Atinka TV’s morning show, Ghana Nie, hosted by Ekourba Gyasi, Apostle Alexander Nana Yaw Kumi Larbi said the Church started with Ejura because the Ghana Prisons Service recommended it.

He noted that the church is currently building a bigger one at Nsawam, one at Obuasi, one at Damango, adding that the inmates will be distributed per the Ministry of Interior and the Ghana Prisons Service’s discretion.

Apostle Alexander Nana Yaw Kumi Larbi said with the conditions at the prisons, including how they are packed, the food they eat, if care is not taken, some of the inmates may come out to become hardened criminals.

“When we look at those who are there, we realise that most of them are from poor homes. Some might have stolen a fowl, someone might have engaged in a fight and hit someone with an object, someone might have stolen cassava, or a child and most of them could not get money to pay. These are marginalized and destitute who are there and so we are targeting them because their salvation is important to us,” he said.

Apostle Alexander Nana Yaw Kumi Larbi said the COP is going to sign a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the chaplains at the prisons to do total reformation, rehabilitation and also to add value to the lives of the prisoners.

“We are going to teach them morals and virtues so that by the time they come out, they can forgive because they have received counselling. Some of them went there because they might have been wrongly accused, so by the time they come out they will be positive,” he added.