Human rights activists under the National NGO Forum have disagreed with President Yoweri Museveni’s proposal to consider having some of the convicted murderers hanged.
President Museveni yesterday stated that the increasing crime might force him revise his position on death penalty saying that his leniency wad causing Ugandans to think they can cause harm to others and walk away with it.
“I believe that this lenience is becoming a problem. I am going to revise this and hang a few. We must hang some of these people because if you see how they kill people, they deserve to be killed,” Museveni said on Thursday while he was presiding over the passing out of Ugandan prisons warders, wardresses and non-commissioned officers at Luzira Prisons.
But in reaction to the President’s comments, the Executive Director Human Rights Network (HURINET), Muhammad Ndifuna notes that dignity and life is one thing government cannot take away from an individual hence disagreeing with hanging as a penalty.
He explained that on many occasions in different countries, people who have been hanged turn out to be innocent of the crimes for which they were convicted, noting that putting such people on death row is torturous to their families and relatives.
Ndifuna further advised that government should rather strengthen its criminal investigations capabilities so as to successfully prosecute criminals unlike the current situation wherr self-proclaimed criminals are left scorch free in the guise of aiding state with investigations.
“In Uganda, we were making progress as far as abolishing death penalty is concerned but what the President is talking about is a retrogressive taking us back from upholding the dignity of human beings,” Ndifuna said on Friday during a press conference.
“As human rights activists, we disagree with the President on that,” Ndifuna added.
“We feel like criminals can be handled in many other ways, like enhancing criminal investigations, turning criminal management into a science rather than gambling that is very evident by our security forces consorting with criminal gangs.”
Uganda hasn’t made any executions for convicts sentenced to death for the last 10 years. A total of 213 convicts await their fate to be determined by the President who has the discretionary powers to do sign off their execution.
During President Museveni’s 30 year tenure, he has only signed off 2 executions.
Human rights activists who oppose the death penalty propose that the punishment be converted into life imprisonment instead. They say capital punishment infringes on individual rights.
