Death penalty abolition, public hearings date set

Zim Now Writer

Public hearings for the abolition of capital punishment from law and practice have been set Monday 6 April, in the wake of calls from different rights groups to put an end to the penalty.

The Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs will lead proceedings of the public hearings, which got Cabinet approval in February this year.

This followed a motion to introduce a Bill on the abolition of the death penalty raised by Dzivaresekwa Citizens Coalition for Change MP, Edwin Mushoriwa in Parliament last year.

The Constitution provides for the death penalty which, however excludes women and men under the age of 21 and those over 70 years, with Veritas proposing a retrial for all death sentence inmates in Zimbabwe.

President Emmerson Mnangagwa has on various occasions denounced the act following his pre-independence death sentence escape on a technicality.

Currently, Zimbabwe has 62 death penalty convicted prisoners, with the last act of the penalty conducted in 2005.

Zimbabwe seeks to join over 170 countries across the world that have abolished the penalty, among them Southern African nations, Mozambique, Zambia, South Africa, Namibia among others.