Abolishing death penalty will increase mob justice – Avoka

The Member of Parliament for Zebilla constituency in the Upper East Region, Cletus Apul Avoka, has kicked against calls for the abolishment of the death penalty from Ghana’s legal books.

Legislators were divided over the report of the Constitutional, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Committee on the Criminal Offences Amendment Act, which seeks to replace the death penalty with life imprisonment.

“Where is the evidence that when the death penalty is taken out of our books, people will not commit murder.

Already, people do not have confidence in the judicial system, and if you now go around telling people that if you kill somebody, you will not die, then you are inviting Ghanaians to take the law into their hands and do instant justice.”

Avoka further rebutted claims that there is less crime in countries that have abolished the death penalty saying the jurisdictions are different and will not work in the case of Ghana.

“There is very little logical argument to the conversation that the peaceful countries in the world do not have the death penalty in their books

“There is no empirical proof that in Ghana if we abolish the death penalty, people will not commit heinous crimes