(Originally published 16 December 2005)
Singapore’s death penalty policy is something that has recently become something of an issue for me. The death penalty I suspect is something that the average Singaporean cares very little for. Even if they did, there is very little information about the death penalty available to the public, and certainly not enough to allow them to form their own judgements and conclusions. In true PAP fashion, there is no public consultation and discussion on the matter, and parliamentary objections and debates are conveniently ignored in the local media. Until recently, I was one of those who knew very little about and cared very little for the fates of those unfortunate souls who would lose their lives because our legal system decided so. I was convinced, perhaps by years and years of controlled information by the voice of the government – the local media – that the death penalty works, that our legal system enforces it fairly and consistently and that drug trafficking is as serious a crime as premeditated murder. While I was aware that there have been many cases of wrongful execution in other countries, like the USA, I was certain that this would never happen in Singapore. My faith has wavered but not entirely diminished.
In Singapore, a person may be sentenced to death if convicted of any of the following crimes: murder, treason, drug trafficking and certain firearms offences. I believe that the punishment should always be proportionate to the crime and I simply cannot fathom how drug trafficking demands as severe a penalty as murder. Sure, Singapore’s geographical position and proximity to the Golden Triangle makes her a vulnerable and convenient passageway for the global trafficking of drugs and therefore steps have to be taken to prevent this. But death for those who attempt to do so, thereby making what they do equal to murder in the first degree? Surely not. It’s nothing short of barbaric if you ask me.
Some argue that drug traffickers deserve the death penalty because like murderers, they kill – by providing the otherwise unavailable drugs to users who abuse them to death. However it must be noted that to convict a man of murder, factual evidence of his intent and that his action directly contributed to the person’s death must be presented. Drugs cases however are largely tried on the bases of legal assumptions. The most significant of these assumes that a man is trafficking even if he is merely in possession of drugs which exceed stipulated amounts. To systematically subject a human being to the anguish of the gallows based on assumption cannot be right, can it?
Indeed, the government’s strong stance against drugs is reflected in their ad campaigns which unfortunately over-simplify the whole issue of drug use with convenient taglines such as ‘Drugs Destroy Lives’. Drugs do not destroy lives. People do – people who use them excessively and abuse them with little regard and respect for life. By imposing the death penalty on drug traffickers, we are merely shifting the blame, taking it off the shoulders of these so-called victims and placing it conveniently on the back of the necks of the convicted traffickers. Drug traffickers should be punished, yes, but not by death.
I sympathise greatly with those who are sent to the gallows for drugs offences, infinitely more so than those sentenced to death for any other crime. What we are doing is undermining their right to life with the excuse that what they did is more wrong in Singapore than anywhere else in the world, even in the developed parts. And we do this with simple and generic rules. But when it comes to human life, nothing should ever be that simple. Most of those sent to the gallows for drugs offences are the very poor, uneducated and in some cases, even mentally deficient (as in one very recent case where a man with an IQ of 65 was sentenced to death for trafficking marijuana). We do not know what led to them committing their acts of transgression. Perhaps they were unaware of the consequences, let down by their lack of education and awareness about the world. Perhaps they were forced into the situation by their extreme poverty, in a quest to survive, in a world where the divide between the rich and poor is so wide we often take for granted just how privileged we are to have food on the table daily. We are so used to the luxury that we cannot imagine how far a person would go to have that same luxury and immediately assume those who commit such acts do so out of sheer greed and evil. For all our progress and prosperity, we seem to have lost our basic human faculty of compassion.
Singapore’s death penalty policy is something that has recently become something of an issue for me. The death penalty I suspect is something that the average Singaporean cares very little for. Even if they did, there is very little information about the death penalty available to the public, and certainly not enough to allow them to form their own judgements and conclusions. In true PAP fashion, there is no public consultation and discussion on the matter, and parliamentary objections and debates are conveniently ignored in the local media. Until recently, I was one of those who knew very little about and cared very little for the fates of those unfortunate souls who would lose their lives because our legal system decided so. I was convinced, perhaps by years and years of controlled information by the voice of the government – the local media – that the death penalty works, that our legal system enforces it fairly and consistently and that drug trafficking is as serious a crime as premeditated murder. While I was aware that there have been many cases of wrongful execution in other countries, like the USA, I was certain that this would never happen in Singapore. My faith has wavered but not entirely diminished.
In Singapore, a person may be sentenced to death if convicted of any of the following crimes: murder, treason, drug trafficking and certain firearms offences. I believe that the punishment should always be proportionate to the crime and I simply cannot fathom how drug trafficking demands as severe a penalty as murder. Sure, Singapore’s geographical position and proximity to the Golden Triangle makes her a vulnerable and convenient passageway for the global trafficking of drugs and therefore steps have to be taken to prevent this. But death for those who attempt to do so, thereby making what they do equal to murder in the first degree? Surely not. It’s nothing short of barbaric if you ask me.
Some argue that drug traffickers deserve the death penalty because like murderers, they kill – by providing the otherwise unavailable drugs to users who abuse them to death. However it must be noted that to convict a man of murder, factual evidence of his intent and that his action directly contributed to the person’s death must be presented. Drugs cases however are largely tried on the bases of legal assumptions. The most significant of these assumes that a man is trafficking even if he is merely in possession of drugs which exceed stipulated amounts. To systematically subject a human being to the anguish of the gallows based on assumption cannot be right, can it?
Indeed, the government’s strong stance against drugs is reflected in their ad campaigns which unfortunately over-simplify the whole issue of drug use with convenient taglines such as ‘Drugs Destroy Lives’. Drugs do not destroy lives. People do – people who use them excessively and abuse them with little regard and respect for life. By imposing the death penalty on drug traffickers, we are merely shifting the blame, taking it off the shoulders of these so-called victims and placing it conveniently on the back of the necks of the convicted traffickers. Drug traffickers should be punished, yes, but not by death.
I sympathise greatly with those who are sent to the gallows for drugs offences, infinitely more so than those sentenced to death for any other crime. What we are doing is undermining their right to life with the excuse that what they did is more wrong in Singapore than anywhere else in the world, even in the developed parts. And we do this with simple and generic rules. But when it comes to human life, nothing should ever be that simple. Most of those sent to the gallows for drugs offences are the very poor, uneducated and in some cases, even mentally deficient (as in one very recent case where a man with an IQ of 65 was sentenced to death for trafficking marijuana). We do not know what led to them committing their acts of transgression. Perhaps they were unaware of the consequences, let down by their lack of education and awareness about the world. Perhaps they were forced into the situation by their extreme poverty, in a quest to survive, in a world where the divide between the rich and poor is so wide we often take for granted just how privileged we are to have food on the table daily. We are so used to the luxury that we cannot imagine how far a person would go to have that same luxury and immediately assume those who commit such acts do so out of sheer greed and evil. For all our progress and prosperity, we seem to have lost our basic human faculty of compassion.
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