Two mistakes that cost SA

Our first mistake was to try and create the USA, Canada and Europe in Africa. We forget that people in those countries do not kill people because they are albinos or for muthi purposes, or for being suspected of being witches.

Our second mistake was to construe freedom and human rights with the absence of the death penalty. That is, we think that the death penalty means no freedom and no human rights.

I have many friends in Botswana who say in that country policemen need not carry a gun when on duty. They also say that if you want to invite the death penalty, kill a policeman or, for that matter, any other person.

In South Africa, policemen are killed almost every day. If policemen are not safe, what about ordinary citizens?

We blame the policemen, we blame the justice system because a criminal who gets a life sentence may be freed on parole after more or less 20 years. That is wrong. We must blame the law.

As a country, we should be discussing how to amend the Constitution so as accommodate the death penalty.

We must ask those countries who reinstated the death penalty as to whether or not violent crime has been reduced there, and stop theorising.

Maybe another mistake is to define human rights as inherent and not deserved. It’s high time that human rights are deserved.

Sim Nawa, e-mail