[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

July 30




ZIMBABWE:

Our hope is on Mnangagwa



I remember it was in 2013 in Bulawayo in Cowdray Part Surbub at Mukitika 
Primary School on a Sunday. The COPAC had announced that they will hold a 
public hearing on the proposed Zimbabwe Constitution. Although the meeting was 
supposed to be attended by Cowdray Park residence ZANU PF bussed people from 
nearby plots and farms with an obvious aim to disrupt the hearings. Thanks for 
the Honourable legislators who were chairing the meeting progressed without any 
incidence.

After the meeting had been officially opened deliberations started. We first 
discussed the Bill of Rights. There was a rare unity between ZANU PF and MDC 
supporters on the Bill of Rights. All people present unanimously agreed that 
every Zimbabwean must have a right to life. We agreed that no one must be 
allowed to take away someone's life for whatever reasons. Christians contended 
that nobody have a right to take anybody's life except God the life giver. MDC 
ZANU PF Christians we unanimously agreed on that.

We then moved to the issue of the death penalty or death sentence whether it 
must be maintained in the constitution or total be removed. There was a 
contestation of ideas here. It seemed the majority wanted the death sentence to 
be maintained. Suddenly people changed. It looks like they had completely 
forgotten what we had agreed under the Bill of Rights. Speaker after speaker 
stood up to support the idea of maintaining the death sentence in the 
constitution. I was given a chance to speak. I advocated for the removal of the 
death sentence reminding the gathering what we had just agreed under the Bill 
of Right. Unfortunately I was in the minority. When the issue was finally put 
to vote we lost. People wanted the death sentence to be retained in the New 
Constitution of Zimbabwe. It was sad.

The death sentence had always a controversial topic. Some people are in support 
of it some are against it.However, it must be noted that people are being 
killed throughout the world almost every day, a number are still on death row. 
Some people are being killed for trivial crimes like "who you sleep with, in 
others it is reserved for acts of terror and murder." (Amnesty International)

The author is of the view that Zimbabweans made a great mistake in retaining 
the death sentence in the new constitution which we voted for in 2013.The 
author advocate for the total removal of the death sentence from our 
constitution and laws.

According to Amnesty International the death penalty is unfair because before 
anyone is executed he or she is made to wait for years on the death row. 
Certain Japanese man was made to wait for 46 years not knowing when his time 
was to come. In Zimbabwe we have people who are still on the death raw for more 
than 10 years now. It's unfair.

The death penalty is also cruel, inhuman and degrading. According to Salil 
Shelty "The death penalty is a symptom of a culture of violence, not a solution 
to it." Execution methods includes beheading, electrocution, hanging, lethal 
injection, shooting in the back of the head or shooting by a firing squad. It's 
so chilling, ruthless, cruel and violent.

The other issue is humans can make errors and judges are not an exception. 
Let's say someone is erroneously charged and erroneously convicted and 
sentenced to death and then killed immediately. If at a later stage it is found 
out that the person was erroneously convicted, it is not possible to reverse 
the killing of an innocent person.

I had also pointed it out in one of my recent articles that long jail sentences 
do not deter crime. The idea that long jail terms deter crime hasn't been 
proven anywhere this includes the death sentence, it doesn't deter crime in any 
way. Life sentences are rather better than the death sentence in serious 
crimes.

The death penalty is also discriminatory. The Amnesty International says it is 
the poor belonging to a "wrong "race, ethnic group, religious minority group, 
or political party that end up facing the gallows. In Zimbabwe the 
discrimination is quite glare, it is men only who can be given the death 
sentence women are spared. We were not told the reasons for this discriminatory 
nature of sentencing. We all know that 52% of Zimbabwean population are women 
then why kill the few and spare the majority. Is there any motive to extinguish 
men in Zimbabwe?

The death penalty breaches two essential human rights: the right to life and 
right to live a life free from torture. Both rights are protected under the 
Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the United Nations in 1948, 
according to Amnesty International. Zimbabwe is a member of United Nations, why 
are we then killing people violating their rights?

Since 1948 the momentum to ban the death sentence globally is growing. As of 
2016 104 countries had totally banned the death penalty including the majority 
of countries in Southern Africa but Zimbabwe still maintains the death penalty 
in its laws.

Vice President Mnangagwa who is also the Minister of Justice has been quoted on 
numerous occasions in the media as saying he is opposed to the death penalty. 
Recently he crafted the first constitutional amendment which was adopted by 
parliament. We hope that he will do the honourable thing and craft the second 
constitutional amendment and remove totally the death sentence from our 
constitution. I also hope that legislators from ZANU and MDC will unanimously 
vote and approve the 2nd constitutional amendment to remove the death sentence 
from the Zimbabwean Constitution.

(source: Opinion; Etiwel Mutero is an archivist and political 
commentator----bulawayo24.com)








INDIA:

Gopal Gandhi opposes death penalty in all cases



This vehement opposition to death penalty springs from myth that it can lead to 
increase in murders. Facts show otherwise.

The process to elect the Vice-President of the country has started. There is a 
straight fight between the NDA candidate Venkaiah Naidu, and Opposition's Gopal 
Krishna Gandhi. But this piece is not about the election. It is about the place 
of death penalty in a civilised country like ours, in the context of the 
protests against Gopal Gandhi on the ground that he had asked for Yakub Menon's 
death penalty to be commuted to life imprisonment in the Mumbai blasts case, 
which had killed many innocent citizens. Headlines were flashed to say that 
Gopal Gandhi wanted mercy to be given to the terrorists. This was an incorrect 
interpretation of what he had said. It is not denied that Gopal Gandhi has been 
a long time opponent of death penalty. Around 2 years ago, the Law Commission 
of India had held a seminar on death penalty. I was one of the speakers there. 
I am for the abolition of death penalty. A near unanimous resolution was passed 
there for the abolition of death penalty. Consistent with his stand, Gopal 
Gandhi too voted for the abolition of death penalty. In fact for abolitionists 
like us, the judgement is not based on any individual case, but on the 
principle that death sentence to anyone is inconsistent with a civilised 
society and does not even serve as a deterrent and violates human rights.

Let us recall that some the greatest men have all opposed death penalty. 
Gandhiji said, "I do regard death sentence as contrary to ahimsa. Only He can 
take it who gives it." Freedom fighter and socialist leader Jayaprakash Narayan 
said, "To my mind, it is ultimately a question of respect for life and human 
approach to those who commit grievous hurts to others. Death sentence is no 
remedy for such crimes."

Dr B.R. Ambedkar, during the Constituent Assembly debates said, "I think that 
having regard to this fact, the proper thing for this country to do is to 
abolish the death sentence altogether."

The High Commissioner for Human Rights, Louise Arbour called the death penalty 
"...a sanction that should have no place in any society that claims to value 
human rights and the inviolability of the person". President Eduardo Frei of 
Chile said, "I cannot believe that to defend life and punish the person that 
kills, the State should in its turn kill. The death penalty is as inhuman as 
the crime which motivates it."

The vociferous opposition to the abolition of death penalty springs from myth 
that it can lead to increase of murders. Facts show otherwise. Thus, in 1945-50 
the State of Travancore, which had no death penalty, had 962 murders, whereas 
during 1950-55, when death sentence was introduced, there were 967 murders. In 
Canada, after the abolition of death penalty in 1976, the homicide rate has 
declined. In 2000, there were 542 homicides in Canada - 16 less than in 1998 
and 159 less than in 1975 (1 year prior to the abolition of capital 
punishment).

In 1997, the Attorney General of Massachusetts (US) said, "there is not a shred 
of credible evidence that the death penalty lowers the murder rate. In fact, 
without the death penalty the murder rate in Massachusetts is about 1/2 the 
national average."

Death penalty has been abolished since 1965 in UK. The membership of European 
Union is dependent on having no death penalty. This has been done obviously in 
the confidence that murders do not get automatically reduced by retaining death 
penalty.

The South African Constitutional Court unanimously ruled in 1995 that death 
penalty was unconstitutional as it constituted "cruel, inhuman or degrading 
treatment or punishment".

At present, 105 countries have abolished death penalty in law for all crimes - 
a majority of world states, as of April 2017.

I may also remind critics of Gopal Gandhi that when India wanted Abu Salem, who 
was then living in Portugal, to proceed against him for the same Mumbai 1993 
blasts, Government of India gave an undertaking to Portugal that he would not 
be given the death penalty. That is why, although convicted, he has been given 
the life sentence.

The injustice of death as a penalty has a hoary past. Although death penalty 
was briefly banned in China between 747 and 759 AD, modern opposition to death 
penalty stems from the book of the Italian Cesare Beccaria Dei Delitti e Delle 
Pene (On Crimes and Punishments), published in 1764. Influenced by the book, 
Grand Duke Leopold II of Habsburg, the future Emperor of Austria, abolished 
death penalty in the then-independent Granducato di Toscana (Tuscany). It was 
the 1st permanent abolition in modern times. On 30 November 1786, after having 
de facto blocked capital executions (the last was in 1769), Leopold promulgated 
the reform of the penal code that abolished death penalty and ordered the 
destruction of all the instruments for capital execution in his land. In 2000, 
Tuscany's regional authorities instituted an annual holiday on 30 November to 
commemorate the event. The event is also commemorated on this day by 300 cities 
around the world celebrating the Cities for the Life Day.

In 1849, the Roman Republic became the 1st country to ban capital punishment in 
its Constitution. Venezuela abolished death penalty in 1863 and Portugal did so 
in 1867.

Will the critics of Gopal Gandhi on the death penalty issue please have the 
courtesy of apologising for their totally unsustainable comments?

(source: sundayguardianlive.com)








EGYPT:

Court sentences 8 to death over violent crimes against police



Cairo Criminal Court referred documents of 8 defendants on Saturday, in the 
case known as the "storming of Helwan police station," to Egypt's Grand Mufti 
Shawky Allam in preparation of their death sentence penalty.

The court said it sent its verdict to Egypt's Grand Mufti for his opinion, on 
whether or not their ruling was in accordance with Sharia law (Islamic law). 
The Mufti's opinion is almost always in favor of the judge's verdict.

The court adjourned the verdicts against the rest of the defendants, 60, until 
October 10 to read the ruling on all defendants in 1 session.

The case incidents date back to August 2013, when the defendants besieged 
Helwan police station and hurled Molotov cocktails, stones and shot at forces 
in the station, killing 3 policemen, and 2 bystanders.

19 others were injured in the seige, which burnt the station, 20 police 
vehicles, and 3 private cars.

The defendants face a number of charges including joining a militant group, 
intended to disrupt the constitution and laws, murder and attempted murder, and 
possession of unlicensed firearms.

(source: egyptindependent.com)