Quarter of Luzira death row convicts innocent - Rwakasisi

By Josephine Maseruka                  

NEWLY appointed presidential Advisor on security Chris Rwakasisi has revealed that 25% of the 505 in-mates on the death row at Luzira Maximum prison are innocent.

 Rwakasisi who spent 24 years in incarceration in Luzira prison until his release on the presidential  pardon ; on Monday  decampaigned the death penalty before foreign diplomats and human rights activists.

He stated, “When you say hanging is inhuman, cruel and degrading- yes they are good words; but I lived in that life of cruelty and degradation.”

Adding, “I was a Cabinet minister for security in the Obote II regime. If a person of my caliber could be sentenced to death innocently what happens to the majority of low status.”

Rwakasisi explained to an attentive audience, “I neither by omission nor commission committed the offence. I will always say this. I was innocently sentenced to death.”

He said that those advocating for a death penalty say ‘eye for an eye’ but in my case it was eye for nothing.”

Rwakasisi was given an opportunity   to address the gathering at the marking of the World Day against the death penalty under the theme ‘the inhumanity of the death penalty.”

Rwakasisi was on June 30, 1988 sentenced to death by the High court on five counts of kidnapping with intent to murder. 

He stated, “No judicial system world-over cannot error and miscarriage of justice can only be corrected and beneficial when the convict is still alive.”

He cited two cases of Zzizinga and Eddy Mpagi who he said were convicted on crimes they never committed.

“This has been brought to the DPP’s attention but they are delaying the reconsideration of the cases becauise they are scared of taking the blame.”

Rwakasisi said that in the case on Mpagi, the person he was alleged to have murdered was later found doing his business in Jinja.

The function coincided with the launching of the ‘death penalty project’ by the local NGO – the Foundation for Human Rights Initiative (FHRI); which was launched by the British High Commissioner to Uganda Martin Shearman.

The United Kingdom and Northern Ireland’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office have made an initial funding of sh60m to the project; which aims at promoting access to justice for death –row inmates.

FHRI executive director Livingstone Ssewanyana said that the money will only cover mitigation costs for 16 death-row inmates.

He said the campaign against the death penalty is about how ‘we treat those who offend society, how we promoted reconciliation and how we ensure respect for human dignity.”

He called for legal reforms, reviewing of cases of people on the death-row and reaching out to stakeholders like the judiciary, Parliament, law enforcement and promoting sentencing guidelines.

Ssewanya urged Uganda government to ratify the second optimal protocol abolishing the death penalty.             

To date 139 countries have abolished the death penalty, 34 have instituted a moratorium on executions while 58 remain retentionists.

In Africa 13 countries have abolished the death penalty among them Rwanda, Senegal, Namibia , south Africa, Mozambique, Angola , Burundi , Cape Verde , Ivory Coast , Djibouti , Gabon , Seychelles and Guinea Bissau.

Twenty one African States have instituted a moratorium while 15 remain retentionists. 

Uganda still retains the death penalty for capital offences although noexecutions have been carried out since 2002. There are 505 in mates on the death row of whom 35 are women as by September 30 th, 2011.