The Malawi Human Rights Commission(MHRC) has commended the Chief Justice Andrew Nyirenda’s led Supreme Court of Malawi for abolishing death sentence in country as right step towards restoring dignity to human rights especially right to life.
On 28th of April, 2021 the Supreme Court ruled that death sentence is unconstitutional and illegal on Khoviwa vs Republic case.
“For the past two sessions of the Universal Periodic Review, the Human Rights Committee of the United Nations has recommended to the Malawi Government to consider abolishing the death penalty by signing the Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Article 6 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) states that every person has the inherent right to life and that the right must be protected by law. The ICCPR is premised on the presumption that all countries must abolish death penalty. That is why Article 6(6) of the same Covenant provides that “Nothing in this article shall be invoked to delay or to prevent the abolition of capital punishment by any State Party to the present Covenant’. What the Supreme Court has done, therefore takes Malawi towards the desired status in the international community.
“This landmark ruling follows yet another landmark ruling in 2007 when the Constitutional Court declared that the mandatory death sentence in capital offences was unconstitutional. This was in the case of Francis Kafantayeni and others vs the Attorney General (Constitutional Case No. 12 of 2005). In the case of McLemonce Yacini versus the Republic (MSCA CRIMINAL APPEAL NO. 29 of 2OO5) the Constitutional Court ordered that all inmates that had been sentenced to death before the abolition of the mandatory death sentence should have their sentences reheard by the High Court. Following that ruling, the Commission coordinated a Sentence Rehearing Project which facilitated the rehearing of sentences for 154 inmates. Of these, 50 inmates were immediately released while 62 received definite sentences of varying lengths but which resulted in their immediate release. Thus, in total 112 inmates were immediately released through the sentence rehearing project and many more have been released since then after serving their custodial sentences.”, said Osman a well known human rights defender since her tertiary education.
In the statement which has been signed by the Commission’s Executive Secretary, Habiba Osman who holds Masters degree in International Human Rights Law from the Notre Same, Indiana, United States of America further says that she expects government of Dr Lazarus McCarthy Chakwera to speed up the process so that justice is seen delivered to the incarcerated persons.
“In line with the judgement of the Supreme Court, the Commission calls upon Government to ensure that all those persons who were recently sentenced to death and are on death row, should have their sentences commuted to life”, said Osman who is also Gender Expert and Anti- Human Trafficking Advocate who has worked with UN Women and Norwegian Church Aid before joining the taxpayers human rights watchdog.
Section 16 of the Constitution provides for right to life
Malawi Human Rights Commission is established under section 129 of the Constitution to protect and investigate all violations of human rights in Malawi.
