E EPISCOPAL CHURCHPEOPI.E for a FREE SOUTHERN AFRICA c 339 lafayette Street, New York, N.Y. 10012·2725 s (21 2) 4n .0066 r Ax : c212 > 9 7 9 -1 o 13 A #162 2 o. June 19.as -·· ~UARDIAN Mail & Guardian . · Vol11 No 24, June 9 to 141995 • Published by M&G Media, 139 Smit Street. Braamfontein, Johannesburg, and is the South­ em African edition of The Guardian WfM!tdy, 75 ~Farringdon Road, London EC1 M 3HQ, UK. Noose gets the gallows T took three days of court argument, Hani should be beheaded in public, or companied the National Party request to three-and-a-half months of deliberation those perpetuating violence in ·change the Constitution to allow the state and 244 pages of opinion for the Consti­ KwaZulu/Natal be locked up without tJial, to kill people. But ifyou water down the tutional Court to re-establish the sanctity or that abortionists should be jailed. But a right to life in the Bill of Rights, you will be of life in South Afiica by declaring invalid Bill of Rights is intended to assert that giving up the most basic, the most impor­ Ithe death penalty. This week's decision is a some rights are so fundamental to democ­ tant, the most fundamental right of all. maJor break from the past. It brtngs to an racy that they are inviolable. It is intended There could be an argument for this if end South Afiica's long-standing dominance to ensure that individuals and minorities there were substantial evidence that the of the international capital punishment are protected from the vagaries of public death penalty was an effectiVe deterrent to market And it is the first time in this coun­ opinion. crime; or that one could eliminate the pos­ tJy that new institutions have given the Hopefully we have a government strong sibilities of errors which sometimes take rights of individuals ascendancy over the enough not to feel the need to pander to the wrong person to the gallows: or remove force of public opinion. public opinion on this. One would expect the likelihood that some defendants - Those who argue that the 11 judges are the National Party to latch on to this pop­ those without access to proper defence­ over-riding public opinion, or that a matter ulist cause, as it has, forgetting quickly would be more likely to be hanged than of this sort should be settled bv referen­ that it found itself unable to hang anyone others. But none of these over-ride the dum. miss the point of a Bill of Rights and in the last few years of its government. most basic argument against capital pun­ a Constitutional Court. The function of It is worth noting that there was an out­ ishment: that this countly, more than these new institutions is to give individuals cry when President Nelson Mandela said most, needs to re-establish the sanctity of and minmities protection from the shifting he would ask for changes in the Constitu­ human life, not continue to degrade it. You winds of public opinion. The public may tion if it was necessary to prevent violence cannot do this by giving the state the right come to believe that the killers of Chris in KwaZulu/Natal. No such outcry has ac- to kill. THE GUARDIAN THE NOOSE has been lifted for good. The ••••••••••••• Wednesday June 7 1995 .•••••••••••••••••••••••••••• formal ending of South Africa's death penalty, already in abeyance for the past five years, sends an important signal in a A formal farewelfto execut.on world where the forces of abolition are Yesterday's ruling by South Africa's only just holding their own. This is partie· Constitutional Court is especially heart· Last weekend 42 people were murderea ularly encouraging in the light of South ening in contrast to the appalling fre­ in and around Johannesburg in what Africa's own unhappy past record over quency with which the death sentence police described as a "normal" weekend decades in this field. v:as until recently imposed. Its abolition of crime and the daily aver1uie of murders About half of the world's countries have is indeed a necessary rejection of this across South Africa last year was 50. already abolished the death penalty and a past. During the 19BOs there was an almost Some relentionists yesterday were argu. few more join the rejectionist ranks each ing that abolition sends "tqe wrong sig· UI:broken upward trend in the annual . nal" in a country whose crime rate is year. Not all those where it exists on the 1 statute book still use it. In 1993, the death number of executions, which reached at I among the highest in the world. Yet the. sentence was passed in 61 countries and least 100 a year. The death sentence was figures surely suggest the Qpposi~e. If the carried out in only 32. But some of the imposed disproportionately on the black death penalty has over so manY years world's most powerful states continue to population by an almost entirely white failed to restrain crimes of murder, how employ it. It has been revived in an judiciary. As is still the case in many can it be said to deter1 The Constitutional increasing number of US states and thou· states of the US, black defenpants stood a Court's verdict is clear and in line with a sands are executed every year in China. greater chance of being sentenced to death 1 growing body of international human Japan is one of several countries where it than white defendants, especially when ; rights law: "Everyone, including the most has been restored or extended. Exem· the victim was white. Since executions abominable of human beings, has the plary, often extra-legal, execution is on were suspended by the then President F W right to life and · capital punishment is the rise in several states where it is I de Klerk in 1990, more than 450 prisoners therefore unconstitutional." South Africll employed as a deliberate instrument of have been waiting on death row. While has many bitter problems but Archbishop counter-terror- with Algeria now one of: most of these are black, they also include Tutu is right to be "thrilled for our the worst" examples. In a more visibly ' some more recently convict~ whites in· country" at a decision which adds moral violent world, the danger is that states , eluding the two ultra-rightists who plotted stature when it is·much needed. threatened with violence will resort to i and carried out the murder of Chris Rani. punitive capital punishment instead of: tackling the causes of social unrest. THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL WEDNESDAY, JUNE 7, 1995 South Africa's Supreme Court Abolishes Death Penalty I By HOWARD\\'. FRENCH Reacting to the ruling, Justice point in a statement to the court jority of South Africans supported JOHANNESBURG, South Africa, Minister Dullah Omar said the pris­ during his trial for incitement in the death penalty, F. W. de Klerk, .June 6- In its first major decision, oners would be quickly moved from 1962. "I have grave fears that this vice president in the country's coali­ South Africa's recently created su­ death row. According to prison war-. system of justice may enable the tion transition Government, said preme court abolished the death dens, the announcement set off a guilty to drag the innocent before the that his National Party, a predomi­ .penalty today, ending a decades-old round of wild celebration among con­ courts," he said. "It enables the un­ nantly white party that had gov­ practice of executing criminals con­ demned inmates at Pretoria's Cen­ just to prosecute and demand venge­ erned the country for decades under victed of serious crimes that had tral Prison. ance against the just. It may tend to apartheid, would campaign to re­ once given the country one of the Elsewhere, however, comments lower the standards of fairness ap­ Instate capital punishment. world's highest rates of capital pun­ on the ruling revealed the continuing plied in the country's courts by white Other conservative white groups ishment. depths of political division among judicial officers to black lltigants." reacted even more harshly. "The Announcing the unanimous deci­ South Africans that typically run Two years later, in another trial, rights of murderers and rapists are sion, Arthur Chaskalson, president along racial lines, one year after the Mr. Mandela was sentenced to life being held In higher regard than of the Constitutional ·Court, said, formal end of apartheid. imprisonment for conspiracy to those of their victims," said one Afri· "Everyone, including the most On radio talk shows today, reac­ overthrow the government, a judg­ kaner youth organization. abominable of human beings, has a tions were deeply split between ment that his supporters saw as a For his part, Mr. Mandela, who . right to life, and capital punishment black and white, with the former victory because the death sentence served 27 years of a life sentence is therefore unconstitutional." typically applauding the abolition of was not imposed, even as they de­ under a succession of apartheid gov­ · That the Constitutional Court the death penalty, while the latter, plored Mr. Mandela's conviction. ernments, made no public comment chose the death penalty issue for its invoking high crime rates, criticized Conservative white groups con­ today on the ruling. The President's .first major ruling underscored the what many whites say is a gradual demned the ruling while many pre­ .office, however, issued a statement importance of the issue in a country slide away from law and order.