TO HANG OR NOT TO HANG DRUG LORDS?
Death penalty for whatever crime is a retrogressive punishment - Analyst
The Presidential Commission of Inquiry into the Review of the Constitution has recommended that the Death Penalty should be imposed on drug lords and traffickers.
The Voice staffer, engages legislators and analysts on the matter.
Wynter Mmolotsi - Leader of Minority in Parliament
Drugs have destroyed many lives, especially of young people. One leading cause of youth destruction and depression after unemployment is drug abuse. The commission’s recommendation that the death penalty be imposed on drug lords and traffickers is a welcome development. Selling drugs to young people is tantamount to sentencing them to death and it is only fair that they also die.
Motsumi Marobela - Analyst
The death penalty does not serve as a deterrent or a solution to whoever commits whatever the nature of crime. That is why even when people are aware of the dire consequences, still such crimes like drug trading prevail. Capital punishment is inhuman, barbaric and against modern ethos of civilisation and democratic governance. The Presidential Constitutional Review Commission doesn’t reflect the views of all Batswana. It’s legitimacy has been questioned following the failure to consult broadly on its terms of reference and composition of the panel, which was solely appointed by the ruling party government. There are other burning issues that the Commissioners should have recommended like the right to employment, housing, education and welfare.
Monametsi Sokwe - BOCONGO Executive Director
What is the end game with the death penalty? It is a vicious circle of murderers killing innocent people and the state killing perpetrators, there is no end because we are not dealing with root causes. I think we need to deal with our societal problems that lead to extreme violence and the death penalty is proving ineffective hence year in year out, it’s the same issue. Right now, with the recent crimes, more people are dying at the hands of blood thirsty security apparatus to satisfy a blood-thirsty society, the state is perpetuating extreme violence. Someone has to stop the killing for killings to stop and I challenge the state to introspect and restrain its apparatus to stop thinking about killing as a first response mechanism and take a step further to stop state-sponsored killing by way of the death penalty.
Adam Mfundisi - Analyst
Botswana is an exception to the transformational changes taking place in the global space. This conservative and retrogressive Presidential Commission of Enquiry was a non-starter. It is designed to deliver incremental and retrogressive recommendations to it’s political handler. The composition of this Commission is reflective of the recommendations aimed at maintaining the status quo and entrench the Botswana Democratic Party stronghold side in the country. Most of the members are known conservative people who are loyalists, supporters, apologists and activists of CAVA BDP and its leadership. The President chose them deliberately to deliver his objectives. The recommendations are not reflective of vision, needs, interests, aspirations, ideas, perspectives of the majority of citizens. We watched and listened to the articulations by people in public fora. This strategy is to manipulate the Constitutional process to promote the whims and caprices of the President and BDP should fail. Parliament and voters must reject the recommendations of the President and BDP Commission of Inquiry. A long and protracted debate and result must begin. Opposition parties and civil society must defend our democratic and constitutional gains since independence. The President and BDP must be stopped in their tracks before they destroy our peace and tranquillity we enjoyed since the birth of modern Botswana. The death penalty, for whatever crime, is a retrogressive punishment. A society that is faced with high unemployment, poverty, inequality and other ills, the weaklings are victims. There is no conclusive evidence that capital punishment is a deterrent. And the poor are always at the receiving end. Why not include corruption in the category of capital punishable crime? Corruption causes more long-term harm to society than some of the crimes proposed. BDP and its leadership are instruments of corruption and therefore cannot include it. The Commission of Inquiry and its creator must fall.
“Parliament and voters must reject the recommendations of the President and BDP Commission of Inquiry. A long and protracted debate and result must begin.”