La situation des droits de l’Homme
WATHI propose une sélection de documents sur le contexte économique, social et politique au Ghana. Chaque document est présenté sous forme d’extraits qui peuvent faire l’objet de légères modifications. Les notes de bas ou de fin de page ne sont pas reprises dans les versions de WATHI. Nous vous invitons à consulter les documents originaux pour toute citation et tout travail de recherche.
GHANA 2015/2016
Amnesty international
https://www.amnesty.org/fr/countries/africa/ghana/report-ghana/
Extraits
Des informations ont fait état d’un recours excessif à la force par la police lors de manifestations et d’expulsions de masse. De nouveaux cas de mauvais traitements et de torture ont été dénoncés et les conditions carcérales demeuraient difficiles. Les violences à l’égard des femmes restaient répandues ; le bannissement pour sorcellerie, en particulier, était source de préoccupation. Les personnes LGBTI étaient victimes de discrimination et certaines ont été agressées. De nouvelles condamnations à la peine capitale ont été prononcées.
Contexte
L’examen de la Constitution a accusé des retards en raison d’un recours en justice contestant la légalité de la Commission de révision de la Constitution. En octobre, la Cour suprême a classé l’affaire sans suite.
Liberté de réunion
En septembre, à la suite d’un désaccord sur l’itinéraire du cortège, la police a dispersé, à coups de gaz lacrymogènes et de matraque, des personnes participant à une manifestation pacifique. Cette marche était organisée par le groupe de pression Let My Vote Count Alliance dans le but de réclamer l’établissement d’une nouvelle liste électorale.
En octobre, le rapporteur spécial des Nations unies sur la torture s’est rendu au Ghana dans le cadre du suivi de la mise en application des recommandations formulées à la suite de sa visite en 2013. Il a salué les progrès réalisés mais il s’est également dit préoccupé par le fait que la police et les services du renseignement continuent de recourir à la torture et à d’autres mauvais traitements.
Il a par ailleurs noté que les mécanismes de supervision ne faisaient preuve ni de la diligence requise, ni de la célérité nécessaire lorsqu’il s’agissait d’enquêter sur les allégations de torture ou d’autres mauvais traitements, et que le système d’aide juridique devait être renforcé et mis en œuvre de manière efficace. Il n’a pas constaté de baisse notable de la surpopulation carcérale ou d’amélioration des conditions de détention, caractérisées notamment par de mauvaises conditions sanitaires et une alimentation insuffisante.
Droits en matière de logement
Une politique nationale en matière de logement a été adoptée en mars en vue de fournir des habitations décentes et abordables qui soient également faciles d’accès et durables
Les 20 et 21 juin, plusieurs milliers de personnes ont été expulsées du plus grand bidonville d’Accra, Old Fadama. Environ 50 000 personnes vivaient dans ce quartier, surnommé Sodome et Gomorrhe. La police a utilisé des gaz lacrymogènes contre des manifestants qui s’opposaient à la démolition d’Old Fadama et plusieurs personnes ont été blessées. Amnesty International a exprimé sa préoccupation à l’idée que ces expulsions n’étaient pas conformes aux normes internationales relatives aux droits humains, estimant que de meilleures lignes directrices étaient nécessaires.
Violences faites aux femmes et aux filles
Les violences faites aux femmes et aux filles demeuraient très répandues. Ces dernières années, plusieurs centaines de femmes ont été accusées de sorcellerie par des membres de leur communauté et condamnées à vivre dans des camps isolés avec un accès très limité aux services de santé, à l’éducation et aux installations sanitaires, entre autres. En décembre 2014, le gouvernement, en collaboration avec des chefs traditionnels et la société civile, a fermé le camp de Bonyasi, utilisé pour interner les femmes accusées de sorcellerie, et il a annoncé la fermeture d’autres camps, mais quelques-uns étaient toujours opérationnels fin 2015.
Droits des lesbiennes, des gays et des personnes bisexuelles, transgenres ou intersexuées
Les relations sexuelles consenties entre hommes demeuraient une infraction pénale. De nombreuses personnes LGBTI ont été victimes de harcèlement de la part de la police, de discrimination et de violences. En février, des célébrités ghanéennes ont condamné le passage à tabac d’un organisateur d’événements musicaux soupçonné d’être gay. En septembre, la police a arrêté Sulley Fuiseni, le meneur de Safety Empire, un groupe accusé d’agresser des personnes LGBTI à Nima, un quartier d’Accra. Son procès n’était pas terminé à la fin de l’année.
Peine de mort
Aucune exécution n’a eu lieu depuis 1993. Toutefois, le Ghana n’a pas aboli la peine capitale et les tribunaux ont continué de prononcer des condamnations à mort. Le gouvernement n’a pris aucune mesure au cours de l’année pour répondre aux recommandations formulées en 2014 par le Comité des droits de l’homme [ONU], qui avait notamment condamné le recours automatique et obligatoire à la peine capitale au Ghana.
Les propositions de la Commission de révision de la Constitution pour abolir la peine de mort étaient au point mort en raison des retards accumulés dans le processus de révision de la Constitution.
Precious Metal, Cheap Labour, 2015
Human Rights Watch
Excerpts
Ghana is one of the world’s top 10 gold producers. Many traders and refiners prefer to source gold from Ghana—a stable democracy—rather than from controversial conflict-affected regions. However, companies that do buy gold from Ghana risk benefiting from hazardous child labor.
Around one-third of Ghana’s gold is mined in artisanal and small-scale mines, locally called galamsey, and exported at a trade value well above US$1 billion per year. Artisanal and small-scale mines operate with simple machinery, limited investment, and a large workforce. Most of these mines operate illegally without a license and belong to the informal sector. They offer important income opportunities for Ghana’s rural populations, but also encourage hazardous child labor and cause serious environmental damage.
This report documents the use of child labor in artisanal and small-scale mines in Ghana’s Western, Central, and Ashanti Regions, focusing on unlicensed sites, which constitute the vast majority of mines. It also analyzes the measures that some gold traders and refiners take to avoid supporting child labor by buying gold mined with child labor.
Thousands of children work in Ghana’s artisanal and small-scale gold mines in hazardous conditions, despite both Ghanaian and international law prohibiting hazardous child labor. Most children are aged 15 to 17, but younger children work in mining too. The youngest child interviewed by Human Rights Watch was 9 years old.
Children work alongside family members, are sent to work by their families, or work on their own. They work anything from a few hours to 14 hours a day, pulling the gold ore out of shafts, carrying heavy loads of ore, and crushing it. Children wash the ore on a sluice (a board) and pan it. Finally, they work with mercury, a highly toxic metal, by amalgamating it with gold and then burning the amalgam to separate out the gold.
Children suffer numerous health consequences from mining work. The heavy lifting causes pain in the back, head, neck, joints, and arms, and can lead to long-term spinal damage. Some children suffer from respiratory disease as a result of the dust produced from crushing ore. Children have been injured in mine collapses, when working with sharp tools, and during other accidents. In April 2013, a 17-year-old boy was killed by a mudslide at a mine near Dunkwa-on-Offin, Central Region.
Children working with gold are often exposed to high levels of mercury. Mercury attacks the central nervous system and can cause lifelong disability, including brain damage, and even death. Mercury is particularly harmful to children, but is readily available in some gold trading shops and provided by gold traders to child laborers. Children—and adults—have limited and sometimes false information about mercury, and usually do not know its risks or how to protect themselves properly from this toxic metal.
While the majority of children working in mining are boys, girls mine gold too or do other jobs on mining sites, such as selling food or other items. They face the additional risk of sexual harassment, sexual exploitation, and rape.
Ghana, 2016
Freedom House
https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-press/2016/ghana
Excerpts
Status change explanation: Ghana’s status declined from Free to Partly Free due stepped-up attempts to limit coverage of news events and confiscation of equipment; increases in violence directed at journalists by the police, the military, political party members, and ordinary citizens, including the first murder of a journalist in more than 20 years; and continued electricity outages that impaired media production and distribution.
Overview
Ghana’s reputation as one of the freest media environments in sub-Saharan Africa was tarnished in 2015 by a series of physical attacks against journalists, often by state officials, as well as by intensifying legal and financial pressure on reporters and media outlets.
Key Developments
• In December 2015, Parliament adopted guidelines requiring the operators of public electronic communications or broadcasting services to submit content to a government media commission for approval before dissemination. The failure to do so can result in fines or a jail sentence of up to five years.
• Two senior judges sued a number of journalists and the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) advocacy group for defamation in connection with an exposé implicating them and other members of the judiciary in a widespread bribery scandal.
• Radio journalist George Abanga was shot and killed in September, marking the first murder of a journalist in connection with their work in more than 20 years.
• Frequent power outages forced media outlets to turn to costly alternative power sources in order to publish or broadcast.
Legal Environment: 8 / 30
While freedom of the press is legally guaranteed, protections for the media have eroded under the administration of President John Dramani Mahama. In December 2015, Parliament approved content standards regulations that compel operators of public electronic communications or broadcasting services to obtain authorization from the National Media Commission (NMC) before the content is disseminated. Violations can result in fines or a jail sentence of up to five years. The measure’s passage prompted concern among media freedom advocates that authorities were effectively reintroducing criminal penalties for journalistic activity.
Criminal libel and sedition laws were repealed in 2001, but the publication of false news with intent to “cause fear and alarm to the public or to disturb the public peace” remains a misdemeanor under Ghana’s criminal code. Current and former public officials, as well as private citizens, sometimes pursue civil libel suits with exorbitant compensation requests against journalists and media outlets.
In September 2015, a High Court judge, Justice Paul Uuter Dery, sued prominent investigative reporter Anas Aremeyaw Anas, three other journalists, and the executive director of the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) advocacy group for contempt of court in connection with an exposé Anas had produced over a period of two years that implicated Dery and more than 30 other judges, as well as over 100 judicial service staff, in a widespread bribery scandal—a story that had a major impact on Ghana’s political and judicial systems.
Dery also sought an injunction against a video Anas had produced that featured footage of the alleged bribe-taking. In November, Gilbert Ayisi Addo, another High Court judge implicated in the scandal, sued nine parties including journalists, media outlets, and the MFWA for defamation in connection with the public screening of the video, and is seeking heavy damages. The cases were pending at the year’s end.
Political Environment: 12 / 40 (↓2)
While the constitution protects the state-run Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC) from government interference, political parties attempt to influence coverage. Private media face editorial pressure from their owners, particularly those with political connections. Mahama has called for increased regulation of the media in order to avoid the spread of false information that could damage the country’s international reputation, and, citing increasing partisanship, has called for radio stations to invite fewer political party representatives to their talk shows.
Journalists faced an increased risk of physical attacks while performing their jobs in 2015, from government and military officials, the police, and members of the public. Such attacks typically went unpunished. In February, police officers attacked reporters who were trying to film a dispute between the police and a motorist. An official investigation was promised but no results had been issued at the year’s end. In May, military officers attacked Michael Creg Afful of the private radio station Oman FM while he was photographing a construction site being developed by a firm owned by the president’s brother, who was on the scene at time.
The officers also seized Afful’s phone and deleted photographs he had taken. The same month, supporters of the opposition New Patriotic Party attacked a Starr FM journalist who was attempting to interview them at a meeting. In June, residents attacked journalists from multiple outlets who were covering a demonstration against the demolition of homes in Accra’s Old Fadama neighborhood; police failed to protect reporters during the incident.
In September, Stan Dogbe, a top aide to Mahama, assaulted and smashed the tape recorder of a GBC journalist he had accused of eavesdropping; the incident took place at a hospital where members of the presidential press corps were being treated following a car accident. The GBC declined to file a police report, treating the case as an “internal matter.” Subsequently, the MFWA and 155 journalists jointly petitioned Mahama to sanction his aide, but they did not receive a response from the president by year’s end.
Economic Environment: 11 / 30 (↓1)
Ghana has a total of 58 authorized television operators and 390 FM radio stations, of which 37 are state-owned, 273 are private, 63 are community-owned, and 17 are operated by universities. Dozens of newspapers, including two state-owned and two private dailies, publish regularly. Use of the internet is growing, but penetration remains low, at approximately 24 percent in 2015. Blogging and social networking have increased in urban centers.
Economic sustainability is a challenge for Ghana’s media. The GBC receives inadequate funding from the government and must sell advertising to support operations, which leaves the outlet dependent on the large corporations that can afford its rates. Meanwhile, electricity fluctuations, known as dumsor, had adverse effects on media houses in 2015, forcing them to turn to costly alternative power sources in order to publish or broadcast.
Journalists are poorly paid, and many are willing to accept money in exchange for covering particular events. In April, Mahama’s chief of staff came under criticism for giving between 500 and 1,000 cedis ($130 and $260) to prominent journalists he had invited to a meeting, including some known for criticism of the government. Most reportedly accepted the money.
Credits Photo: RFI