2 Committees To Aid Court System

By William Yaw Owusu

Monday, 06 November 2006
Two committees to facilitate and support the administration of justice in the country were inaugurated in Accra on Friday.

They are the committee on mainstreaming Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) and the Committee on Child Panel, both to be chaired by Justice Georgina T. Wood, a Supreme Court judge.

The ADR committee will facilitate the disposal of cases out of court while the child panel committee is to assist the district assemblies to ensure that cases involving children are handled with care.

Inaugurating them, Justice William Atugubah, a Supreme Court judge said, "ADR is an indispensable way of resolving human conflicts satisfactorily."

He said the courts system had been overloaded with cases and the ADR mechanism was one of the surest ways of helping to ease the pressure on the courts.

He said ADR is a sacred social function that needs to be encouraged to ensure a smooth administration of justice, adding that "it can help establish a peaceful and united system."

On the child panel, Justice Atugubah said the proliferation of western culture had made it difficult for parents to have total control over their children.

As a result, more child-related cases had found their way to the courts, he said adding, "the juvenile misdirection in the country can therefore be effectively arrested by the guidance of this committee."

Mrs. Justice Wood who spoke on behalf of the Chief Justice said "the alarming and frightening statistics of the number of disputes that find their way into the courts make ADR concept one of the best approaches to fulfilling over mandate."

She said the ADR concept forms part of the new court rules and has been incorporated into the court system.

"A well structured programme for recruiting, managing and maintaining experts in ADR and children’s issues will be put in place to ensure that the programme gets a national touch," she said.

She also commended some legal firms and practitioners as well as individuals for offering pro bono (free) legal services to the Judicial Service.

Nene Amegatcher, a member of the ADR committee on behalf of other members promised to live up to expectation as far as administration of justice was concerned.