Determined to deal with the escalating murders in the country, the 8-month-old People's Partnership coalition has announced new legislation to amend the Trinidad and Tobago Constitution in order to facilitate the implementation of the death penalty.
Prime Minister Kamla Persad Bissessar, whose administration has the required parliamentary special majority to ensure passage of the new legislation, told legislators it was necessary to adopt a tough stance on murders since "in every tear shed by relatives of every murder victim there is a desperate cry for justice.
"Mothers have lost their sons and daughters, children are left motherless and fatherless. Homes left without incomes, families destroyed and forced into poverty and worse," she said, adding that "the war on crime cannot be won unless we use every weapon in our arsenal."
According to government statistics, 3, 335 murders have been committed here during the period 2002-2010. There are 42 persons on death row.
The government insists that the death penalty was and remains the law of the land and that the proposed legislation does not introduce any new penalty that did not previously exist.
"It simply seeks to plug some of the loop holes that have been exploited and manipulated by murderers who have been properly convicted and sentenced to death according to law," the Prime Minister said.
Caribbean countries have long complained that rulings by the London-based Privy Council, the final court for some regional countries, have made it much more difficult to carry out the death penalty.
"Any new legislation relating to the implementation of the death penalty that is not protected by the savings clause of the Constitution or the Constitution itself is likely to be quashed without dissent by the Privy Council. These provisions therefore need to be included in the Constitution, which is the supreme law of Trinidad and Tobago," the government said.
The last state execution took place in 1999 and the government may find that it still faces an uphill task executing another convicted murderer.
Social activist Verna St Rose-Greaves, a strong anti-capital punishment advocate, said there is need for an ongoing, informed and sustained debate on this issue.
"I think that we have not even scratched the surface on human rights far less for death penalty. Our crime situation is horrendous and citizens are fearful, angry and concerned. At this time they may not be as open to education on the issue. "
"But it is in difficult times and situations that the mettle of good leadership is tested. Sometimes we must not do what may be popular but what is right and in the best interest of our society," she told the Caribbean Media Corporation (CMC), adding "the crime situation is where it is because so many of us have walked away from our history, our humanity, our responsibility, our caring and our commitment to nation building.".
Source: Jamaica Observer, January 23, 2011
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