Akwaaba (Welcome) to Ghana and HRAC

Like many things in Ghana my internship took a while to get straightened out, but now everything is in order. After arriving in Ghana and going to the orientation for my original internship I realized that the organization, the Centre for Popular Education and Human Rights Ghana, was not exactly how they made it seem via email; they intended me to work with school children. Luckily they put me in contact with one of their partner organizations, the Human Rights Advocacy Centre and I was able to switch placements within a week.

HRAC is a human rights advocacy and research center headed by Nana Oye Lithur, a prominent human rights lawyer in Ghana. The main objectives of the office are research into various areas of human rights and client advocacy. Clients come into the office daily when they have some sort of legal problem, someone does an intake interview with them and then Nana reviews the case to determine the next step. Because Nana is the only lawyer in the office and there are limited resources (each client is only charged 5 Ghana Cedis (about $3.50) ) she can only take on a few cases and the rest must be referred to other legal services or the government is urged to take on the case. Although clients are often referred, HRAC maintains contact with the client and monitors the case as it moves through the court. Yesterday I was given my first case (I was assigned one last week but the client ended up changing her mind); a woman who needed a paternity test from the court and was requesting maintenance (child support) from the baby’s father who refused to acknowledge his daughter. I interviewed the woman and created a budget of her monthly expenses to take care of the child. Next, a co-worker and I took her to the juvenile court to file her case. Because the system is slightly different here, the client does not need a lawyer to argue for her requests, it is a decision involving only the two parties and the judge. Although we are not providing her with legal representation I will be following the case and going to court with the client on the day or her hearing.

My main project thus far has been working on a legal audit of laws protecting those living with HIV/AIDS in Ghana for submission to UNAIDS. Thus far my group and I have done the necessary background research and completed questionnaires for interviews; we will be doing interviews with people living with HIV to assess their knowledge of their legal rights. We are also interviewing the groups most vulnerable to HIV (men who have sex with men, commercial sex workers and IV drug users) to assess their knowledge of their rights and get a picture of the discrimination they face and if they are able to seek adequate representation. We have just begun to organize the groups.

Although HIV prevalence is relatively low in Ghana (about 1.9% as of 2009) there is an incredibly high stigma attached to having HIV. Ghana is an extremely religious country (with the majority of the country being Christian, some Muslims and others practicing traditional religion) where HIV can be viewed by some a problem brought on by improper behavior. Compounded with the fact that the most vulnerable groups are also those that are not looked upon favorably by society (being a MSM in Ghana is a crime) people often fear seeking treatment or using the legal system to fight any discrimination they have faced. Although people cannot be removed from their homes for being HIV positive, they cannot be forced to take an HIV test, and a person’s HIV status is supposed to remain confidential these are often not maintained in practice. Part of our research was supposed to include case law, but when we spoke to the Court’s librarian when we traveled to the court to do research (I never thought I would miss our West Law and Lexis databases so much) we were told that he had never seen a case in the court where a person was suing another party because discrimination due to their HIV status. Although our budget is low, (we must pay the participants and can only afford about 4 people from each group) we are hoping to get a better picture of these type of situations.

This is a village court in the Eastern Region where HRAC's Executive Director, Nana Oye Lithur, argued in the defense of a man who allegedly stole three fish from a Tilapia farming company. The company is currently claiming property rights over a much larger portion of the Volta Lake than they actually own and committing various human rights abuses to the community members including preventing their access to the lake and having security guards beat up anyone who breaks their rules.

My first month here has been fairly slow but hopefully things will pick up soon. My posting has been delayed mainly because I use the little time the internet functions at work to research and by the time I get home at night (the traffic in Accra is horrendous) I don’t have the energy to go to an internet café.

While I haven’t developed much of an attachment to Accra, I’ve met so many wonderful people. The best parts of Ghana I’ve seen so far are away from the tourist attractions and in the small villages where the people are eager to share their culture. I’ve been fortunate enough to have several weekends where my friends and I are the only Obrunis (which literally means white skin, but its generally used to refer to any foreigner) around. We even had the opportunity to go to a festival and (tried to) learn the Borborbor, the traditional dance of the Volta region (see picture on the right). Everyday here there is some new adventure, whether it is getting a tro-tro home or celebrating a world cup game (sadly the Black Stars didn’t get as far as they should have, but Ghanaians are still proud of their team) and I’m looking forward to seeing what’s next.

Medasi (Thanks) for reading!