[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

July 4



PAKISTAN:

Abolition of death penalty


The cabinet of Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani has approved a decision
to commute the death sentence of 7,000 persons on the death row to life
imprisonment, barring habitual criminals guilty of heinous crimes. On the
occasion of the birthday anniversary of Ms Benazir Bhutto, Mr Gilani had
announced that his government would make recommendations to President
Pervez Musharraf to commute the death sentences of thousands of prisoners
to life imprisonment as a birthday tribute to Ms Bhutto.

The move has aroused some opposition within the coalition government and
among a section of the public, but it has been welcomed by a majority as
the first step in the direction of abolishing the death sentence in line
with the practise in many modern nation-states. The religious rejection
from the clergy was spearheaded by JUI leader Maulana Fazlur Rehman who is
opposed in principle to the power of the president of the republic to
"forgive" a death sentence given under Islamic law. The reaction of the
common man or the future "victims" of the decision is more related to
Pakistan's abysmal social conditions in which crime is rampant despite the
deterrence of the death sentence.

People who have been aroused into bringing their opposition to the TV
channels are those whose rivals have been sentenced to death recently by
the courts. Their fear is that once taken out of death row and sent to
prison for life, the killers would organise revenge attacks on them. One
can, of course, argue with this angle, but the bottom line is that
commutation goes against the instinct of revenge as justice, and that
conditions surrounding the execution of law in Pakistan are not compatible
with all the requirements of justice.

Those who favour a rationalisation of the laws often face despair when
they discover that all reform of bad laws is considered heresy by those
who trace them to divine origin. The reformists think that if such bad
laws as diyat (blood money), rijm (stoning to death) and blasphemy remain
on the statute books, it is better to abolish the death penalty to save
innocent people from being unfairly killed. Then there are subtexts to the
laws dubbed sharia that simply cry out for reform. One is the concept of
the wali. A man kills his wife but is set free because he is the wali or
protector of his (and his murdered wife's) children. There is also the
"Islamic way" of commuting or "forgiving" a death sentence. Under the law
of diyat, the wali of the killed person can "forgive" the killer after
receiving money from the killers family. There is therefore malpractice
galore under a law that goes in favour of a rich and powerful killer who
can force the family of the victim to take diyat and keep quiet. This is
why most human rights organisations list the abolition of the death
sentence in their charters.

The European Union has abolished the death sentence, but in America the
states differ in practice. In the Third World, uniformly, the idea of
abolition doesn't find much support. Leaving aside the clergy in Pakistan
who would add more legal conditions to allow the state to kill through the
doctrine of fitna  realistic legalists also hesitate before accepting the
argument of the abolitionists. There are many objections, but the biggest
is the abysmal condition of the prisons. When conditions of free life are
nearly as tough as the one in prison, people dont mind killing. Poor
people can also start killing for money if it is only prison they get.
Death alone is a deterrence for many.

The government has made a one-time gesture which might reprieve some
persons wrongly sentenced to death. However, one must emphasise that such
people are often not victims of miscarriage of justice but of the law
under which the judge is helpless to award death. We refer to the
Blasphemy Law where innocent people are hauled up before the court and
made to suffer the death penalty without first being proved guilty in
intent. This law is so badly framed that one wishes that its victims,
usually members of our non-Muslim communities, could be saved through an
abolition of the death penalty.

Maybe the time has not come yet to abolish the death penalty. Perhaps at
some point in the future, Pakistan might be mentally more attuned to
considering the matter. At this time, however, death has become cheap
under laws that the various warlords calling themselves "Islamic soldiers"
have imposed in parts of Pakistan. For example, the warlord of the Khyber,
Mangal Bagh, suddenly the favourite of many as the army goes in to unseat
him from his throne, has killed innocent people under "Islamic sharia".
Another warlord in Swat, Fazlullah, has beheaded innocent people also
under allegedly "Islamic" inspiration.

The jury is out on the death sentence. The task is to first put in place a
legal system that can actually obtain and then sustain the good results of
abolishing the death penalty.

(source: Editorial, Daily Times)