It has been agreed in a recent roundtable discussion in Parliament for a resolution to call for an immediate moratorium on the mandatory death penalty. It was to call for a review of the capital punishment by a Parliamentary caucus.

The caucus will be made up of experts in the legal industry including lawyers, former judges, Non-governmental organisations as well as related stakeholders and parties. Representatives from some related NGOs and some members of the legal fraternity met at the roundtable discussion in Parliament recently where they agreed that there will be more discussions and talks on this issue with prominence given for the drug offences and related crimes.

A statement after the session said that the death penalty although serves as an effective deterrence measure was not proven to be an effective way to reduce crime. Furthermore, drug offences could not be classified as ‘a most serious crime’. Hence capital punishment should not be imposed on this type of crime. It added that the mandatory death penalty has had ‘virtually no impact’ on the illegal sector. In fact, since the Dangerous Drugs Act 1952 was amended in 1983 that brought the death penalty saw a rise of drug related offences in the country.