Francis-Xavier Sosu, the Member of Parliament representing Madina constituency, has revealed that President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo supports the Criminal Offences Amendment Act, which aims to replace the death penalty with life imprisonment.
According to him, President Akufo-Addo is hopeful that the bill will be passed into law by Parliament.
During the parliamentary debate on the amendment bill on Friday, July 14, Members of Parliament expressed differing opinions, causing a division.
Speaking on The Point of View program on Citi TV in favor of abolishing the death penalty and highlighting international conventions protecting human rights, MP Sosu mentioned that President Akufo-Addo, for the first time, voted in support of abolishing the death penalty during a United Nations session, aiming to remove it from the legal frameworks of countries worldwide.
Sosu emphasized that although the death penalty has not been implemented since 1993, there remains a risk that an unscrupulous government could reinstate it to target its adversaries, as seen in the case of Myanmar.
“The president [Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo] at the UN voted in favour of the abolishment of the death penalty for the first time, and he has even made public statements in support of the abolishment. It was the president that called for a cross-party approach to passing this bill when stakeholders called on him, and so he fully endorses and supports the position.”
“The government in 1991 said there were not going to be executions again, but 12 people were executed by firing squad in 1993 and from colonial times till 1993, 37 people were killed.”
“When you take the case of Myanmar, the country had not used the law for 42 years, but it was there on its books and last year when there was a military takeover, they used it against their opponents and gave legal reasons where four leaders were killed, and a hundred others were convicted to death.”
