August 16
KENYA:
Life and Times of Kenya's Last Hangman
His name was Kirugumi wa Wanjuki, not known to many but those who are keen on
history, and those who were unlucky enough to go through his hands.
He lived in a cold village at the foot of the Aberdares, a poor and desolate
man surviving on a meagre pension and a decayed mud house, a reward for his
service to the state.
Kirugumi joined the Prison Service in 1937, where he was stationed at
Kangumbiri Work Camps for seven years before he was moved to Kamiti Prison.
There, he replaced a retiring Indian hangman and served in that capacity for 11
years.
After that, he had a short stint at the King'ong'o maximum prison, where he
served as the official hangman for 4 years before calling it quits in 1974.
Before he joined the Prisons' Service, Kirugumi was a tracker and a
professional game hunter. He was among the men who helped the Askari track the
Mau Mau freedom fighters during the struggle for independence.
The last executions to take place in Kenya was in 1987, with the last victims
being the alleged masterminds of the 1982 coup, Hezekiah Ochuka, and Pancras
Oteyo. Kirugumi wa Wanjiku admitted to being the one who hanged them.
"I got so used to hanging people that at some moment I thought that killing
people was as simple as slaughtering a chicken," he said in a KTN interview a
few months before his death.
The death penalty was repealed in 2016 when President Uhuru Kenyatta invoked
article 133 of the constitution, officially commuting the death sentence to
life imprisonment. This was not the first time this act was done.
Mwai Kibaki had invoked the Prerogative of Mercy and issued a directive to
commute the death penalty to life in prison on August 4, 2009, but President
Uhuru made it official.
The declaration in 2009 sent Kirugumi wa Wanjiku into a frenzy, and he even
offered to hang the prisoners for Kibaki if he would let him. His opinion was
that the death penalty was a deterrent to serious crime, but life imprisonment
will dilute the purpose of punishment for a serious crime.
In an interview conducted by The Standard in 2009, he recounted the last
moments of prisoners before they headed to the gallows.
"Inmates had to be clean before they went to the gallows. We had to ensure that
their nails were well-trimmed, their hair clean-shaven and bodies clean," he
said.
The convicted prisoner was woken up before 5am and led to the gallows, his legs
and his hands bound.
"Some walked in silence, others prayed, some cried and some just went wild," he
added.
Kirugumi expressed the fact that he had no regrets over the prisoners who had
lost their lives through his hands, for all he was doing was delivering justice
as it had been prescribed. His biggest regret, he said, was having to hang a
young person full of potential.
He died on November 2nd, 2009, a desolate and abandoned man, ironically, at
0230hrs, more or less the time he prepared prisoners for their execution. He
did not go out the way he had lived. Instead, he succumbed to pneumonia in the
loneliness of his crumbling house.
His death did not stir excitement in his neighbourhood. His only son Ngung'u
Wanjuki was the one that mourned him, with the villagers giving his compound a
wide berth. The stigma that came with his job trailed him to the last days of
his existence, even as demons tortured him in the night and forced him to drink
heavily just to gather some sanity.
Not many knew about him when he lived, and not many will know about him long
after his death. His name has been plastered in the halls of infamy, to be
remembered as the Last Hangman that this country had.
(source: kenyans.co.ke.)
BANGLADESH:
Bangabandhu’s killer Rashed Chy to be brought back: Law minister
Law Minister Anisul Huq today said that Rashed Chowdhury, a fugitive killer of
Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, will be brought back to the country from the
US.
The minister said this while addressing a programme organised to mark the
National Mourning Day at Akhaura Railway Station premises in Brahmanbaria this
morning.
“2 of the 6 fugitive killers of Bangabandhu are residing in the US and Canada.
We would bring back the one living in the US. Legal steps are on to bring back
the one in Canada as well,” Anisul Huq said.
“Steps are on to trace the whereabouts of the four other fugitive killers,” he
said.
“No matter where they are hiding, they would be extradited to the country and
would be brought to justice,” the minister also said.
“After the assassination of Bangabandhu in 1975, conspiration was on to turn
Bangladesh into a mini Pakistan,” Anisul Huq said, adding “the plot was almost
implemented.”
“It was after the Awami League government under leadership of Sheikh Hasina
took power in 1996 that the fate of the country began to change for the
better,” he added.
Akhaura upazila unit of Awami League organised the programme to observe the
44th death anniversary of Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur
Rahman.
The Supreme Court on November 19, 2009 upheld a High Court verdict, confirming
capital punishment of 12 people, including the 6, for killing Bangabandhu and
most of his family members in a coup d’état on August 15, 1975.
5 of the convicts -- Syed Farooq Rahman, Sultan Shahriar Rashid Khan, Bazlul
Huda, AKM Mohiuddin Ahmed and Mohiuddin Ahmed -- were executed on January 27,
2010. Another killer, Aziz Pasha, died in Zimbabwe in 2001.
Those who remain fugitives are Col (dismissed) Khandaker Abdur Rashid, Lt Col
(relieved) Shariful Haque Dalim, Maj (retd) Noor Chowdhury, Maj (retd) Rashed
Chowdhury, Capt Abdul Majed and Risaldar Moslehuddin Khan.
The extradition of the 6 fugitive killers of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman
saw little progress even a decade after trial proceedings of the assassination
case were completed.
A taskforce comprised of ministers and high officials of the foreign, law and
home ministries was formed in 2010 to locate and bring back the 6.
The government had also made global appeals in bilateral, regional and
international forums to track down the culprits. However, only 2 of the 6 could
be traced -- Rashed Chowdhury in the US and Noor Chowdhury in Canada.
(source: The Daily Star)
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