Capital punishment brands entire families

GORDHAN seems to have managed to cut where possible but provide financial help to those who need it most. However, a decisive solution to the myriad challenges the country currently faces was an impossible task. It is hard to see how a few fairly bold changes will make the vast difference needed to move things forward. It will take something drastic, such as a more positive international economic outlook, or a different approach to business and governance in South Africa, to do that.

On the other hand, we live in a new but resilient democracy, making great changes possible. IN CHINA, it is estimated more than 7 000 people are executed every year. Not so long ago there were no fewer than 65 capital offences. Under world pressure, especially by human rights groups, this figure has steadily declined to 57, still alarmingly high.

However, those of us who repeatedly call for the reinstatement of this scourge in our country, never think about the poor children of these unfortunate souls. In China, such children and their families are ostracised.

However, there is always hope in such desperate situations.

Zhang Shugin, a former prison warder, has opened an orphanage, especially for children who had lost parents on death row.

Her place of refuge is called Sun Village.

A Chinese saying goes: “The son of a murderer is going to be a murderer as well.” Chinese emperors used to order the relatives of sentenced criminals to be killed too.

Mao Zedong believed it was best to lock up families in clan-arrests. His words were: “The son of a hero is a hero. The son of a scoundrel is a scoundrel.”

Many still believe he was right. It is always the poor and the marginalised who suffer such unspeakable atrocities, especially when such myths are embedded in people’s minds.

How much more despicable can capital punishment, the belief in violence, be, taking its followers to the abyss all over the world?