AFRICANEWS

Malawi

The Death Penalty debates rages on in Malawi

Human Rights

Human Rights Organisations have teamed up with religious institutions to pressurise the government get rid of the death penalty. Abolishing the death penalty, as the government would like the people believe, would lead to crime increase.

Malawi retained the death penalty when the country' s new democratic constitution was adopted in 1994. However debate on the issue rages on with human rights orgnisations backed by Amnesty International fighting to have it abolished.

Recently one of the country's human rights organisation Civil Liberties Committee held a round table discussion with members of the press, enticing them to put pressure on the Government to abolish the death penalty.

"We don't want the issue of death penalty to go through a referendum. We just want it abolished because whenever a referendum is conducted over the issue, the majority will settle for retaining it," observed Executive Director of Civil Liberties Committee, Emmie Chanika.

Chanika says people's views on the issue are purely emotional and they cannot be helpful. She cites the example of South Africa where no referendum was required because doing so would have jeopardised the exercise which she claims was ably handled by President Nelson Mandela.

"The death penalty does not solve any problem. In most cases Government can use the death penalty to eliminate its enemies as it happened in Nigeria in the case of Ogoni leaders" argues Emmie Chanika.

During the debate over constitutional provisions in 1994 many chiefs fought for the retention of the death penalty saying that abolishing it would lead to mass murders.

"We are already faced with a lot of criminal activists in the country. Many people own guns and they use them to rob us, if the death penalty is abolished there will be chaos" said chief Chitera one of the few lady chiefs in the country. She was backed by many other chiefs especially those in districts with a common border with Mozambique, a country blamed for large influx of guns in Malawi. It is alleged that during the civil war in that country many refugees flocked to Malawi with guns.

Religious institutions are giving support to the human rights organisations. A Catholic Priest Father Gambar says the majority are not always right and the issue does not require a referendum.

"If we allow that, life can be taken away - life will lose value and in the end we shall come to allow abortion and mercy killing" he says.

Glen Inglis of Presbyterian Church says: "Jesus taught us to love one another even those who take lives." He adds that the Bible in the book of Romans says do not revenge because God knows how to revenge.

The Muslim Community, slightly a third of Malawi's ten million people views the issue differently. In his contribution to the roundtable discussion a member of the Muslim Association of Malawi, Shiekh Mustafa Ayami said Islamic teachings says people who fail to punish a sinner are also regarded as sinners.

"The Kolan teaches that a person be punished by the same degree of harm he causes on the victim, that's an ear for ear and life for life,"

He said however it is not often that a murderer is executed because it is the aggrieved party that decides whether they should have a reasonable compensation for their murdered relative or it should be life for life.

A lawyer from the Danish Centre for Human Rights in Malawi, Desmond Kaunda reported that 99 countries worldwide have abolished the death penalty while 94 still retains it.

He noted that among the 99 countries that abolished the death penalty 57 has done this for all crimes while 15 countries abolished death penalty for all crimes except for serious crimes. The remaining ten still retain death penalty only that they have not practised it for 10 years. Malawi falls under this category. Since winning the democratic elections in 1994 President Bakili Muluzi has not signed any death warrant and commuted to life those he found on the death row. While the human rights organisations are encouraged by the president's gesture they are quick to point out that this is not good enough.

Father Gambar argues: "In Zambia President Chiluba had promised not to sign for any death penalty but in February last year ten people were executed in Zambia. It is important the death penalty is entirely abolished," Desmond Kaunda agrees: "Some countries claim they retain the death penalty to deter crime. But this is baseless because no research has revealed that crime wanes when death penalty is practised," he said.

Kaunda calls for civic education on the issue other than seeking the views of the public on the issue. "Countries tend to follow public opinion where automatic reaction from them is to retain the death penalty," argues Kaunda. He gives the example of the USA where between 1900 to 1985, 350 murder convicts were found to be innocent of the crime. "But once executed a life cannot be brought back," he adds. Malawi has about 800 inmates awaiting trial on murder-related crimes.

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