Can we trust the ANC government to use the death penalty?

South Africa is shocked and revolted by the brutal murder of Jade Panayiotou, a young school teacher from Kabega park, Port Elizabeth.

Jade was abducted from her house, murdered and her body dumped like waste in the open veld. It was discovered two days later. Another person who could mean so much for the future of our people, but whose life was worth a few miserable Rands drawn from her bank account.

And the soil of this country is soaking up the blood of the innocent again. Front National South-Africa also wants to express our shock and outrage at this and at every other similar incident. We assure the families of our prayers and thoughts in their dark moments and we reconfirm our dedication towards trying to find a long term solution in which our people can be safe.

As a result of this savage act a new Facebook forum was created calling for the re-institution of the death penalty. The forum gained support in excess of 4000 overnight. Understandably that is the first reaction one has. I also stated: They should be bloody hanged from the nearest tree!

The question is: Do we properly consider the implications of capital punishment in a monkey state such as ours? Capital punishment means that the state can take away the life of a person found guilty of certain crimes in order to prevent such a person from committing such a crime again. The question is: Who decides what crime deserves capital punishment? The state, of course.

There will be no vote on the matter. A council of ministers and judiciary experts will decide on that. Can we really take the risk of leaving such a decision in their hands? There are examples from history where “treason” was listed as capital punishment. In post World War I Germany numerous opponents of the state were sent to the guillotine for “treason.”

In Ireland we had the controversial case of sir Roger Casement. And in South Africa the gallows were used once as an instrument to silence the opponents of the government for “High Treason.” Capital punishment will be written into the constitution as a legal tool in the hands of the government.

There will be no structure in the world, afterwards, to challenge the use of it.

My question remains: Can we trust this government to have the moral compass and level of responsibility to use death penalty as an ultimate legal tool and not abuse it as a political tool at their whim? Can we trust a Zuma and a Malema to have such a tool to in their hands. And then the answer is a definite: NO! I am personally also in favour of capital punishment as a legal tool. But in the current South African dispensation this might be a gamble of which the stakes are much higher than what we bother to contemplate when we demand the return of the gallows…

By Daniel Lötter
Front National South Africa

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