Death Penalty Alive and Well in the Gambia


Death Penalty Alive and Well in Gambia

Capital punishment was abolished in 1981, but President Jammeh reinstated it in 1995 as punishment for murder and treason and was recently extended to punish drug trafficking offences.


Death penalty is a way of punishing a person by putting him to death. For ages, human societies used the death penalty to combat crimes.

Criminals are executed-shot, hang, decapitated or stoned to death by 'constituted authorities'. But in recent years, there has been a growing trend against the use of capital punishment. Many countries are beginning to realize the flawed nature of using death to punish 'criminals'. Many countries are abandoning and abolishing capital punishment.

Besides Lang Tombong Tamba and his seven co-accused, the country's death row holds, among others, Sulayman Bah, convicted of killing his housemate in a dispute over money, and Tabara Samba, a woman who convicted of killing her husband by pouring boiling oil over her. February 14, 2011: Sheriff Abba Hydara, 71, from Bakallar Village in the Upper Niumi District of The Gambia's North Bank Region was sentenced to death by Justice Joseph Enwa Ikpala of the Special Criminal Court (SCC) in Banjul for murdering his wife, Basara Hydara, on September 6, 2010. He allegedly shot her. The convict was also alleged to have unlawfully attempted to cause the death of his son, Marabel Hydara by shooting him with a gun on the said date and place.

Yet when it abolished the death penalty in 1981, the West African country was among the first African governments to do so. President Jammeh reinstated the death penalty in 1995 as punishment for murder and treason.

Two dozen people have been sentenced to death in Gambia since then. None have been executed in that time, but neither has anyone been pardoned or had their sentences reduced.

Since Gambian independence in 1965, a death sentence has been carried out only once, when Mustapha Danso was executed for killing the commander of the country's army, Ekou Mahoney, during a failed coup in 1981.

Baboucarr Ceesay, editor of The Daily News newspaper, says the death penalty has not contributed to reducing the murder rate.

"In fact before 1995, we rarely heard of someone being murdered," he says, "but it has hit the headlines frequently over the past few years."

Regarding treason, Ceesay cannot recall a coup attempt during the period when capital punishment was abolished. Since 1995, however, the Gambia has experienced at least four coup attempts since its re-institution.

In October, capital punishment was extended further to punish drug trafficking offences.

Musa Touray, a retired civil servant, says applying the death penalty to drug offences will do little to reduce the spiraling rate of drug trafficking.

"The death penalty is not necessary," he says, "It is too heavy a penalty. What the government should do is to strengthen its surveillance mechanisms."

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime has noted that West Africa has increasingly become a transit point for drugs, with traffickers taking advantage of poverty and poor surveillance to move drugs from South America to Europe.

In June, a record two-tonne stash of cocaine was found in the Gambia, with an estimated street value in Europe of just under a $1billion according to newspaper reports.

The Gambia's amended act states that anyone caught with over 250 grammes of cocaine faces the death penalty if convicted. Those convicted of human trafficking will also face a death sentence.

"The menace of drug trafficking and the activities of major drug lords have started to rear their ugly heads in this jurisdiction in recent times," Attorney General and Justice Minister Edward Anthony Gomez told lawmakers.

"Therefore this bill seeks to nip the negative developments in the bud by providing sentences which will serve as deterent to anyone wishing to use this country either as a transit or destination point for hard drugs."

The bill also covers human trafficking, said Gomez. "Both the strategic location of The Gambia as a gateway to the Western world as well as our liberal immigration policy have attracted the attention of unscrupulous persons in using the country as a transit route for trafficking in persons."


As at today, 139 states have abolished the death penalty in law or practice and 72 have ratified the Second Optional Protocol to International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights which provides for the total abolition of the death penalty. Unfortunately Gambia is not one of them. Gambia has yet to abolish the death penalty. According to Amnesty International, Gambia is a de-facto abolitionist state. The last execution was carried out in 1981. Thirteen death sentences have been passed in since the beginning of the year. In July, eight men accused of procuring arms, equipment and mercenaries to stage a coup against President Yahya Jammeh's government were found guilty of treason and sentenced to death in a trial.

Anna Jefferys/IRIN

The bill also covers human trafficking (file photo).

The theme of this year's 'World Day Against the Death Penalty' is "The Death Penalty casts a Shadow on Democracy". Indeed, capital punishment casts a long shadow on the democracy of any country. The observance of the death penalty is incompatible with democratic norms. The reasons for the abolition of the death penalty are so clear and compelling and should be given serious considerations by the government of the Gambia, and they are as follows:

1. No state should have the power to take a citizen's life.

2. It is irrevocable: no justice system is safe from judicial error and innocent people are likely to be sentenced to death.

3. It is inefficient: it has never been shown that the death penalty deters crimes more effectively than other punishments.

4. It is unfair: the death penalty is discriminatory and is often used disproportionately against the poor, the mentally ill, those from racial and ethnic minorities, and in some places in the world because of discrimination, because of sexual orientation or religion.

5. It does not offer justice to murder victims' families: the effects of murder cannot be erased by more killing, and the death system prolongs the suffering of victims' families.

6. It creates more victims: the death penalty inflicts pain on the families of those on death row.

7. It is inhumane, cruel and degrading: the dreadful conditions on death row inflict extreme psychological suffering and execution is a physical and mental assault.

8. It is applied overwhelmingly in violation of international standards: it breaches the principles of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which states that everyone has the right to life and that no one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. It is also in contradiction with the international trend towards abolition recognized by two votes at the United Nations General Assembly calling for the establishment of a universal moratorium on the use of the death penalty (resolutions 62/149 and 63/168 adopted on 18 December 2007 and 2008)

9. It does not keep society safe.

10. It denies any possibility of rehabilitation to the criminal.

I must underscore the fact that we all can live without the death penalty. Many countries are already doing so. We can fight and prevent crimes in our societies without capital punishment. We can adequately punish those who commit murder, armed robbery and other heinous offences without putting them to death. The campaign to end the death penalty is not just a campaign to save lives; it is a campaign for justice, for human rights and dignity. The death penalty is an out dated form of punishment and should not be associated with the legal system in any civilized and democratic nation in this 21st century. The justice system in the Gambia is better of without it. Humanity is better of without capital punishment. Hence I urge President Yahya Jammeh to get Gambia to join other nations by abolishing the death penalty.

Leo Igwe is the director of the International Humanists and Ethical Union in West Africa

Somalia: Children Bear the Brunt of Conflict


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Hundreds of children younger than five have been wounded in the latest round of fighting in Mogadishu, accounting for almost half of all trauma cases in May, according to WHO

Hundreds of children younger than five have been wounded in the latest round of fighting in Mogadishu, Somalia's capital, accounting for almost half of all trauma cases in May, according to the UN World Health Organization (WHO).

In a press statement issued on 31 May, WHO said recent data showed that the main causes of death among under-fives were burns, chest injuries and internal haemorrhaging caused by blast injuries, shrapnel and bullets.




"Of the 1,590 reported weapons-related injuries in May alone, 735 cases, or 46 percent, were children under the age of five, compared to only 3.5 percent in April," the agency said.

Marthe Everard, WHO's representative for Somalia, said: "This is the highest number of injured children that has been reported since the beginning of this year."

Fighting between government troops, backed by the African Union Mission in Somalia, and Al-Shabab has intensified in Mogadishu in recent weeks, with government troops trying to dislodge the insurgents from several parts of the city that had been under their control.



UN Photo/Milton Grant

A Somali mother and two children waiting for food at a feeding centre in Mogadishu.

In the past week, the fighting has been mostly around Bakara, the largest open-air market in Somalia, with government troops seeking to oust Al-Shabab from the area.

Ahmed Dini of Peaceline, a Somali civil society group that monitors the welfare of children in the country, told IRIN the numbers would be even higher "if you take into consideration that many families are unable to access hospitals and are therefore keeping wounded children at home, taking care of them as best they can.

"Unfortunately, in every instance in Mogadishu, be it displacement, poverty or violence, children are more often than not the most affected," Dini said.

He said civil society groups had, on several occasions, appealed to the warring sides to stop shelling populated areas and to minimize civilian casualties.




"We are also asking them to allow access to those who cannot reach hospitals," Dini said. "We have reports of children dying because they could not [obtain medical care]."

According to WHO, health workers in Mogadishu are "stretched very thin" to treat the high number of war-wounded; in many cases, they lack proper equipment and means to cover all cases.

"Service delivery is hampered by accessibility issues, poor infrastructure and an insufficient number of health facilities," Everard said in the WHO statement. "Wherever health facilities are operating, they often lack very basic and essential medicines, supplies and equipment, operational and logistical support."

More wounded


Somalia: Children Bear the Brunt of Conflict
TOPICAL FOCUS — Somali Children Facing the Worst - UN

Abdirizaq Hassan Ali, head of Mogadishu's Benadir Children's hospital, told IRIN on 31 May that since the beginning of the month, more and more wounded children had been taken to the hospital.

"We are receiving on average 20 to 30 wounded children daily," Ali said.

Previously, he added, the hospital admitted about 10 war-wounded children daily.

Dini said the difference between the latest fighting and past conflict was that "this is more sustained and without let-up. Previously, we have had intense fighting but it would fizzle out after a few days, but now both sides are digging in."

[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations

Cape Verde to Vote in New President



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The Cape Verde archipelago elects a new president Sunday as Pedro Pires steps down after two terms with his ruling party facing a split vote.

The former Portuguese colony off the northwestern coast of Africa, made up of 10 main islands and eight islets, is often lauded for its political and economic stability despite meagre natural resources.




The ruling African Party for the Independence of Cape Verde (PAICV) won an absolute majority in parliament after February legislative polls in which Prime Minister Jose Maria Neves, the head of government, was re-elected.

The party has been buoyed by a decade of growth averaging six percent. But its candidate Manuel Inocencio Sousa faces watered down support with lawmaker Aristides Lima challenging him as an independent.

The main opposition Movement for Democracy (MFD), which is fielding former foreign minister and law professor Jorge Carlos Fonseca, hopes this will boost its chances.

"We will probably go into a run-off and we hope this contradiction will help us elect our president," MFD campaign director, Antoine Moricio Santos, told AFP by telephone.



U.S. Embassy, Cape Verde

Sea salt in Maio Island, Cape Verde.

The two parties have dominated Cape Verde politics since multi-party elections were first held in 1991, with each having ruled for about a decade.

A fourth independent candidate, former soldier and veteran of the independence war, Joaquim Jaime Monteiro, 70, is also in the race.

"It is a very lively presidential election, especially with the PAICV split into two clans," said journalist Nelio dos Santos on national radio.

Lima, a former parliament speaker, decided to run on his own after losing an election to be the ruling party's official candidate.

"I am determined to contribute to Cape Verde continuing on its development path to peace and political stability," he said announcing his candidature.




His party rival Sousa, 60, who is minister of infrastructure, transport and maritime affairs is a Netherlands-trained civil engineer.

Since coming to power in 2001, the ruling party has overseen a spate of development work including the construction of three international airports, ports, and hundreds of kilometres of roads.

Lauded for its stable democracy and peaceful elections, Cape Verde in 2008 became only the second ever country after Botswana to be promoted by the United Nations out of the ranks of the 50 least developed countries.

However despite impressive growth rates it is still vulnerable and highly dependent on international aid.

Fonseca, 60, who lost a presidential bid in 2001, has vowed that if elected, he will focus on social issues and problems concerning youth, women and workers.


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"We need development, unemployment is too high, especially for the youth," said his campaign director Santos.

Unemployment in Cape Verde is officially pegged at 13 percent although the opposition has put it as high as 18 percent, and more of its nationals live abroad (700,000) than at home (500,000).

The archipelago of sandy beaches, lush valleys and arid volcanic rock has an economy dominated by the service sector, which represents 85 percent of GDP. Tourism contributed 25 percent to GDP with 400,000 visitors in 2010.

Just over 300,000 people have registered to vote in the election and some 900 polling stations have been set up on the islands and 35,300 in Africa, America and Europe to cater to the diaspora, said a source from the electoral commission.

AFP

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