MCA Youth: Maintain death sentence with judges having discretion to determine life imprisonment; No to retrospective effect




MCA Youth calls on the Minister in the Prime Minister's Department (Law and Institutional Reforms) Dato’ Seri Azalina Othman Said and the government to reconsider the proposal to maintain life imprisonment as an alternative to mandatory death penalty, instead of imprisonment of not less than 30 or 40 years and a minimum 12 strokes of the rotan.

The topic of abolishing mandatory death penalty sparked the public’s interest in 2018 when the government announced plans to abolish capital punishment. The proposal received much objection from the public, and following that, the government tabled a Bill in 2022 so that judges were given discretionary powers regarding the imposition of lifetime imprisonment as an alternative to the death penalty.

MCA Youth supports the government’s decision to abolish mandatory death penalty, with an alternative sentence based on the court’s discretion, although the government’s decision to allow appeals may be viewed as irrelevant and not empathetic to the family members of victims of violence.

Therefore, the findings of the MCA Youth Executive Team Against the Abolition of the Death Penalty are as below:-

Firstly, the government should ensure that the death penalty is maintained for serious offences involving human lives and national security such as murder, kidnapping, terrorism, conspiring with enemies of the state, etc, so that it continues to be a deterrent effect for potential criminals.

Secondly, the amendment Bill for the abolishment of mandatory death penalty should not apply retrospectively to inmates, as it would affect the rights of the victims’ families who have pursued a fair and just sentence, especially in cases when the lives of loved ones were lost due to the offender’s crimes.

Thirdly, natural life imprisonment should be maintained as the alternative for the mandatory death penalty as proposed in 2022. If the justification for abolishing life imprisonment is due to overcrowding in prison as alleged by Deputy Minister Ramkarpal Singh, then such a decision is unfair to those victims who lost their lives at the hands of these criminals.

Fourthly, if the government introduces imprisonment of not less than 30 or 40 years as the replacement for life imprisonment, the actual imprisonment period after deducting public holidays and taking into account good behaviour, is much fewer than 30 years.

MCA Youth agrees, with respect to basic human rights, that legislative amendments should undertake the role of both punishing criminals and also to preserve peace in society.

MCA Youth therefore calls on the government to ensure that the Bill will emphathise with the victims’ next-of-kin, especially where the lives of their loved ones were extinguished in cases of murder, rape, kidnap, terrorism, when it is tabled later. This will show that the government wields a “zero tolerance” attitude against potential terrorists and criminals if they commit offences where forgiveness is impossible to come by.

-MCA online-