| THE SOUTHERN PROVINCE
REGIONAL OFFICE
The Southern Province Regional Office located at Maxwell Kobe Park,
Off Tikonko Road, Bo commenced operations in August 2003.
The office is a two-storey building located in the heart of the city.
The building contains an office space for the legal practitioner and
head of office, an office for the secretary and office assistant.
Bo is the second largest city with a growing population of over half
a million people. The office is serving the entire southern province
comprising of Moyamba, Pujehun, Jerehun and Bonthe. But the main
constraint is the lack of vehicles to transport the lawyer and other
staff members from one place to the other, which impedes the smooth
running of the work in the area.
Funds for the establishment of this office and its staffing and
running cost from 2003 to December 2005 was provided by the Open Society
Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA), which funded the Centre's Prisoners
Rights Project. This Project deals with the provision of legal advice
representation for detainees and prisoners throughout Sierra Leone.
Most of the Centre's clients live in remote areas like Rotifunk,
Bumpe, Tikonko, Bonthe, Mossenessie Junction and Serabu. The roads are
terrible and it is extremely difficult to access clients and victims of
human rights abuses within these areas, without any form of
transportation.
The majority of cases referred to this office are assault, child
support, sexual offer gender related cases.
This office is no longer functional, and in the implementation of its programs
in Bo and the entire Southern Province of Sierra Leone, the centre collaborates with the Legal Aid Center in Bo
Major activities undertaken by the Southern Province Regional
Office during the past five years
The Prisoners Rights Project
The Southern Province tremendously benefited from The Centre's
Prisoners' Rights Project. A number of detainees and Prisoners who
cannot afford to pay for the services of Lawyers were given free legal
services by the Centre.
The Legal Awareness Project
The Southern Province also benefited from the Legal Education Project
which was a joint venture between LAWCLA and the Canadian Lawyers
Association for International Human Rights to educate litigants
especially accused persons and the general public about their rights in
Court.
The Paralegal Training Program
In February 2004 the Centre trained paralegals in the Bo Office
to enable them to give basic legal advice or legal first aid to clients.
Community Based Organisation (CBO's), Paramount Chiefs, Courts Clerks
and Human Rights Monitors from Mattru Jong, Bonthe, Moyambaand Pujehun
benefited from this training. Those trained are now passing on knowledge
to their townsmen who are not well grounded in the law.
The Juvenile Justice Project
Between August 2004 and July 2005 this Office implemented a countrywide
Juvenile Justice Project entitled, "Legal Protection of Juveniles
and the Promotion of Juvenile Justice in Sierra Leone". This
Project, kindly funded by an anonymous Foundation, consisted of the
following activities:
- An assessment of the law and practice relating to the treatment of
juvenile offenders in Sierra Leone through research, data collection
and on the spot checks.
- A consultative workshop with local experts and groups dealing with
juveniles in Sierra Leone in order to ascertain the nature of the
problems at hand and the needs of juveniles in the country.
- Legal advice and representation of juvenile offenders throughout
Sierra Leone through the Centre's Head Office and the three Regional
Offices in Makeni, Bo and Kenema.
- Workshops and consultations with law enforcement officials and
social workers dealing with juvenile offenders, with the aim of
ensuring that the law (and in particular the provisions of the
Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989)) is applied sensitively
in relation to the treatment of juvenile suspects.
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