President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has joined efforts to have the death penalty removed from Ghana’s legal system.
President Akufo-Addo noted that criminal offenders sentenced to death are instead given life terms, and that it would be rational if the death penalty were abolished entirely.
“Nevertheless, I think that the principle is one that we should move towards in Ghana. In our case in Ghana, since we have made a conscious decision not to invoke the death penalty, then we should do the logical thing and remove it from our statute books. It’s a different matter if we were using it selectively; we are not using it at all,” he said.
“Everybody who is sentenced to death by the courts is automatically commuted to life imprisonment, even though their treatment is still somewhat differentiated”.
The President made the remarks when a group from Amnesty International (AI) paid him a courtesy call at Jubilee House on Friday, calling for the abolition of the death penalty.
He indicated that persons involved in terrorism should be treated differently, adding that people are hesitant to support the abolition of the death penalty when their operations of wiping out villages and communities are being discussed.
“A lot of people have come to me who in principle support the abolition of the death penalty but whenever the issue of terrorism is raised and the mindless manner in which some of these terrorist groups operate to destroy human life, operations which do not involve killing of one person, but involves the annihilation of villages, of communities, people hesitate about supporting the abolition of the death penalty for such actors.”
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The delegation led by the Board Chairman of Amnesty International, Francis Nyantakyi, said, “a private member bill has been introduced in Parliament by Francis-Xavier Sosu, MP for Madina and ranking member of Parliament Select Committee on Legal, Constitutional and Parliamentary Affairs. With your (Mr President) support, we hope that Ghana joins our neighbouring countries Benin, Burkina Faso, Ivory Coast, Togo and a host of other African countries including Sierra Leone, and Liberia, that have abolished the death penalty.”
Francis-Xavier Sosu, Member of Parliament for Madina Constituency, was part of the Amnesty International delegation.
Amnesty International has been calling for the abolition of the death penalty.
Ghana’s last executions occurred in 1993, the year of the country’s transition to civilian control. Twelve persons were executed by firing squad for armed robbery or murder.
In 2021, seven new death sentences were issued, and 165 people were on death row in Ghana at the end of the year.
SOURCE: CITINEWS
