Law and Human Rights - GHANA Volunteer Stories

Danica Mullarkey says:

I tried not to have any expectations as to what my trip to Ghana would bring - reflecting on it now, I can see that that was the best mentality to set off with - literature and TV images cannot compare to the culture shock you experience, in those first few hours, walking the streets of Africa in person.

Placed at the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative I was truly made to feel that being a law student from England was of some real value, and not just merely as a volunteer who had come to make the tea! I was able to get straight into making a difference, and got involved in looking into Human Rights abuses by the Ghana police service, interviewing witnesses and documenting their testimonies, and researching material for the state of prison conditions in Ghana. I was also able to attend Human Rights conferences; among the attendees being the Presidential advisor on HIV/AIDS and met parliamentarians to discuss the state of family-planning services across Ghana. Projects Abroad responded to the interests I had explained pre-departure and placed me with an organisation that truly furthered my interests in Human Rights law.

The day-to-day experiences of being in Accra and the work I was doing certainly encouraged me to become more adventurous than I would have imagined before I left England - By my final week I was keen to explore more of Ghana and made a three-day trip to the north of the country to Tamale, and then on-to Mole National Park to see the elephants.

By the time I returned to Accra and my host family I was due to fly home the following day. I truly felt as though I was only just beginning to get the best out of the experience and wished I could have gone on to meet even more Ghanaians in different parts of the country. I was truly settled and did not want to.

Sasha Fernando, who was an intern in 2006, says:

"I worked mainly on women's issues in the Cape Coast area and held discussions with lots of local people, especially in the villages. The focus was rights awareness and I feel we made a real impact. Of course it was great for my own CV, but I really feel that, although I had no experience of Africa, I was working on a project which the hard-pressed Ghana office could not have finished without Projects Abroad volunteers."

Jordan Helm is involved with the rights of the villagers who libe next to a zone that's being developed into a tourists' game park:

"It's good that the government is developing a game park for tourists but they forget that people live there. The people don't mind being re-settled. the problem is that they get no compensation although they are legally entitled to it. I've written a couple of newspaper articles about this and I've met a lot of people involved. We get to understand the problem, publicise it and help bring about some pressure."

Zoe Carris producing a poster for taxi drivers:

"Police, or people pretending to be police, sometimes say that taxi drivers are driving illegally - they stop them and take bribes. This poster is to educate taxi drivers about their rights without being anti-police."

"I have also been helping with a really difficult problem at some hospitals. A woman may be having a difficult pregnancy and decides to go for treatment and childbirth in hospital, but then finds she can't pay the bill. The hospital;l sometimes won't let the mother take her baby away until she has paid. Possibly you can see the hospital's point of view but the fact is that they are depriving a child and its mother of their rights when they do this."