KARACHI, Sept 10: A strong case for free legal assistance for prisoners without resources of their own was made by speakers at a function here on Saturday. The function was organized by the Legal Aid Office, a non-governmental organization providing free legal aid to the inmates of Karachi’s Special Prison for Women. Sindh Chief Justice Sabihuddin Ahmad, State Bank Governor Ishrat Hussain and National Accountability Bureau chief Lt-Gen Munir Hafeez were among the speakers.

They said that the NGOs were playing significant role in highlighting human rights violations and other such issues. They said there was a lot of room for many other NGOs to come forward to help the deserving prisoners get free legal aid and ensure their cases were decided quickly.

The Legal Aid Office chief former judge of the Supreme Court Justice Nasir Aslam Zahid, giving a brief resume of the organization, said that over 210 inmates of the women’s jail had been provided with free legal assistance since its inception a year back.

He said that when he was the chief justice he had written to the government that more courts be established but the government responded that funds were not available. He said that the government provided billions of rupees in subsidies to different organizations but could not set up new courts so that people could get speedy justice.

Justice Nasir Aslam Zahid said that the Legal Aid Office was a public-private initiative and it was established by the Karachi Women Prisoners Welfare Society on the premises provided by the Sindh government.

He said that one of the basic reasons to organize the function, called Open House, was to invite donors, philanthropists, and concerned citizens to come and see the work being done and get the information, they required.

Since April, he said, around 14 foreigners who had served their jail sentences for drug trafficking had been repatriated to their home countries with the assistance provided by philanthropists. Three others had left for the airport on Saturday morning seven others were scheduled to leave later in the month.

He said that an overwhelming majority of the foreigners in the women prison were Africans and the biggest group among them was from Nigeria. He said that the government should ask its embassy in Nigeria how such a large number of visas were being issued. The visa procedure there should be reviewed, and strict screening should be done, he suggested.