UK group urges Guyana to ‘bin’ death penalty

A United Kingdom group is calling on its supporters to write to Guyana and implore the authorities here to get rid of the death penalty altogether.

Death Watch International, located in London, England, announced on its website that it has its eyes on Guyana with a view to urging the government to abolish the death penalty.

The organisation has what it calls the ‘Bin it!’ campaign, which aims to add to international pressure on countries that retain the death penalty to consign it to the dustbin of history.

“Every month we target a different country. Our current focus is on Guyana in South America,” the website said. According to the organisation, Guyana is the only country in South America which retains the death penalty.

It noted that five people were sentenced to death in Guyana in 2007 – bringing the total on death row to just over 20. Further mention was made of the fact that Guyana voted against a recent United Nations’ resolution calling for a worldwide moratorium on the death penalty.

“Write to their Ambassador to the United Nations asking them to bin (“can”) the death penalty. And if you like, underline your message by including some rubbish (“trash”),” the organisation told its supporters.

It advised that persons email and attach some virtual rubbish. Supporters were asked to keep their messages “short and sweet” and not to be offensive as it would not help the organisation’s cause.

Death Watch International is a not-for-profit organisation which exists to help promote the campaign against the death penalty along with other groups around the world working towards the same goal.

While there are around 30 persons on death row, Guyana has not enforced the death penalty since 1997. However, last year June Head of the Presidential Secretariat Dr Roger Luncheon had said that the government was committed to carrying out capital punishment, but had to find ways around the constitutional and other hurdles that have dogged the application of the law for almost a decade now. He said the administration had to work aggressively to address the problems preventing those on death row from being administered the death penalty.

“Our position is that the law of Guyana recognizes capital punishment. We have to abide by the law,” Luncheon said when asked what was the government’s position on the death penalty.

At the Georgetown Prison, the inmates on death row are housed in a separate cell block, which can accommodate a maximum of 30. Ideally, each inmate is housed in a separate cell and isolated from the general prison population under the strictest security regime at the facility.

Asked what some of the obstacles to the death penalty being enforced were, Luncheon had said there had been appeals on a variety of grounds both at the domestic and external levels.