Inept Judiciary Promotes Lynching
Oct 29, 2002
Mob justice is an archaic, brutal and illegal form of punishment carried out by society or group of individuals on to a person or group of persons who fail to conform to the society’s norms and standards.<br>If left unchecked, mob justice can cause dis
A Frustrated Society That Feels Let Down By Law Enforcers Will Take The Law Into Its Own Hands
By Sam Mutabazi
Mob justice is an archaic, brutal and illegal form of punishment carried out by society or group of individuals on to a person or group of persons who fail to conform to the society’s norms and standards.
If left unchecked, mob justice can cause disharmony and lawlessness in a community that practices it. Some people have argued that the correct term for it should be mob violence or mob injustice, not mob justice, because it is not just any imagination. A society that condones and practices mob justice is on its way to self destruction.
The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the 1995 Uganda Constitution are against mob justice. Article 44 of the Constitution guarantees freedom from torture, cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment; the right to fair hearing and the right to an order of habeas corpus (produce body).
Uganda has witnessed a steady increase in cases of mob justice in recent years. The problem has been blamed on the weak and inefficient judicial system. A corrupt and poorly facilitated Police force, lack awareness and sensitisation of the general public and to a small extent brutal acts in Idi Amin’s regime have cultivated the vice. The period between 1971-1980 witnessed high levels of mob justice because the state thought it would strike terror in the minds of would-be criminals, hence curbing crime. Some Ugandans say Amin’s decision to condone mob justice reduced criminality and demand that the practice be reinstated to curb the growing crime today.
The Inspector General of Police, Major General Katumba Wamala, in an interview Sunday Vision published on April 21, 2002, said from 1991-2002, over 1,000 people were lynched.
A frustrated society will always resort to mob justice when the arm of the law is hopelessly short. According to BBC Online news, mob justice is caused by lack of trust in Government departments responsible for keeping law and order: “Mob justice is as a result of failure in the judicial system, hence people taking the law in their hands...due either feelings of social inequalities or corruption. It is reactionary to the gigantic societal concerns that evidently are not addressed by the state...desperate situations call for desperate measures. If the government is seen to be corrupt and people lose faith in the justice system, what are they to do?†the BBC notes.
Although to some extent it may be true that mob justice is caused by incompetent judicial and Police systems, this is not the sole cause of mob justice. One however may argue that it is the leading cause, as mob justice is minimal or completely non-existent in countries which have well developed justice systems like in Europe and America.
There are some scholars who argue that the death penalty in Uganda has also contributed to the increase in cases of mob justice. Tarcisio Agostoni in his book May The State Kill writes: “The abolition by law of the death penalty is one important factor to sensitise citizens against violence and mob justice. The state must give a good example and eliminate punishment by capital execution. It is violence made legal and exemplary.â€
This assertion may be true, but the death penalty cannot be a big contributory factor to the increase of mob justice in Uganda. Even if the state abolished the death penalty, it is most likely that mob justice would continue. It is however likely that some people may think that because the state kills, they too can imitate the state. It is the duty of the state therefore to ensure that it protects the human life at all times so that its citizens can learn that human beings are expensive and precious and that only the giver of life, who is God, has the authority to take it away.
Victims of Crime in the Developing World, published by United Nations International Crime and Justice Research institute (UNICRRI) carried out an International Crime Victim Survey (ICVS) in 1998 which was geared at gathering information on the strength of police-community relations in developed and developing countries.
The survey found out that, in the respondent perception, that overall, the police do a good job in dealing with reported crimes only in Western Europe and the New World, where more than 0% of the victims said they were satisfied with the way they were treated after reporting burglary and or contact crimes. In the New World a large majority of respondents (74%) were satisfied with the police in controlling crime. On the other hand, half of the respondents from Africa, 43% from countries in transition and as many as 70% from Latin America were not satisfied with the police job in controlling crime.
It should be noted that government some times uses stringent measures on people who engage in mob justice.
This is not likely to solve the problem. The New Vision of Tuesday, June 25, 2002 reported that six convicts of mob justice were sentenced to death by the High Court in Jinja.
Although people who carry out mob justice should be punished to deter others from committing the same crime, Government should not use the death penalty on such people. It should rather use other forms of punishment like life imprisonment.
Mob justice is a crime like any other and should be eliminated. This, however, should be through a concerted effort of all the stakeholders including the Police, the judiciary, the media, Government and human rights organisations and activists. Criminal behaviour is a product of extremely complex societal and personality factors that can be neither corrected nor deterred by law enforcement alone.
Not only is the total Police job a complex one, literary without boundaries, but also in many ways it is thankless and dangerous.
A lot of education and awareness campaigns are needed for the general population to understand that mob justice is not only wrong but illegal and punishable by law. People must be taught that all societies experience crime and evil, but eliminating those who engage in those crimes does not automatically solve the problem.
It should be the work of human rights activists to ensure that communities are sensitised about mob justice. People must be educated that wrong-doers also need a chance to live and probably reform.
The criminal justice process is generally expected to reform or rehabilitate those caught up in it or at least not make them worse.
Communities should be able to recognise that virtually all persons who are sentenced to imprisonment eventually return to community and become law-abiding citizens. This is the corrective function of punishment. People who are lynched are never given this chance of self-realisation and reform.
The liberal principals, which permit the state to punish, must not merely show that punishment achieves some good, but that it is a proper task of the state to pursue that good by these means. Communities may therefore cause harm (through mob justice) in order to prevent the greater harms that would otherwise be caused by crime.
Improving lives in society includes righting the wrongs committed, but given the unfairness of mob justice we may be piling on new wrongs rather than addressing the old ones.
The writer is a student of M.A. Human Rights at Makerere University
By Sam Mutabazi
Mob justice is an archaic, brutal and illegal form of punishment carried out by society or group of individuals on to a person or group of persons who fail to conform to the society’s norms and standards.
If left unchecked, mob justice can cause disharmony and lawlessness in a community that practices it. Some people have argued that the correct term for it should be mob violence or mob injustice, not mob justice, because it is not just any imagination. A society that condones and practices mob justice is on its way to self destruction.
The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the 1995 Uganda Constitution are against mob justice. Article 44 of the Constitution guarantees freedom from torture, cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment; the right to fair hearing and the right to an order of habeas corpus (produce body).
Uganda has witnessed a steady increase in cases of mob justice in recent years. The problem has been blamed on the weak and inefficient judicial system. A corrupt and poorly facilitated Police force, lack awareness and sensitisation of the general public and to a small extent brutal acts in Idi Amin’s regime have cultivated the vice. The period between 1971-1980 witnessed high levels of mob justice because the state thought it would strike terror in the minds of would-be criminals, hence curbing crime. Some Ugandans say Amin’s decision to condone mob justice reduced criminality and demand that the practice be reinstated to curb the growing crime today.
The Inspector General of Police, Major General Katumba Wamala, in an interview Sunday Vision published on April 21, 2002, said from 1991-2002, over 1,000 people were lynched.
A frustrated society will always resort to mob justice when the arm of the law is hopelessly short. According to BBC Online news, mob justice is caused by lack of trust in Government departments responsible for keeping law and order: “Mob justice is as a result of failure in the judicial system, hence people taking the law in their hands...due either feelings of social inequalities or corruption. It is reactionary to the gigantic societal concerns that evidently are not addressed by the state...desperate situations call for desperate measures. If the government is seen to be corrupt and people lose faith in the justice system, what are they to do?†the BBC notes.
Although to some extent it may be true that mob justice is caused by incompetent judicial and Police systems, this is not the sole cause of mob justice. One however may argue that it is the leading cause, as mob justice is minimal or completely non-existent in countries which have well developed justice systems like in Europe and America.
There are some scholars who argue that the death penalty in Uganda has also contributed to the increase in cases of mob justice. Tarcisio Agostoni in his book May The State Kill writes: “The abolition by law of the death penalty is one important factor to sensitise citizens against violence and mob justice. The state must give a good example and eliminate punishment by capital execution. It is violence made legal and exemplary.â€
This assertion may be true, but the death penalty cannot be a big contributory factor to the increase of mob justice in Uganda. Even if the state abolished the death penalty, it is most likely that mob justice would continue. It is however likely that some people may think that because the state kills, they too can imitate the state. It is the duty of the state therefore to ensure that it protects the human life at all times so that its citizens can learn that human beings are expensive and precious and that only the giver of life, who is God, has the authority to take it away.
Victims of Crime in the Developing World, published by United Nations International Crime and Justice Research institute (UNICRRI) carried out an International Crime Victim Survey (ICVS) in 1998 which was geared at gathering information on the strength of police-community relations in developed and developing countries.
The survey found out that, in the respondent perception, that overall, the police do a good job in dealing with reported crimes only in Western Europe and the New World, where more than 0% of the victims said they were satisfied with the way they were treated after reporting burglary and or contact crimes. In the New World a large majority of respondents (74%) were satisfied with the police in controlling crime. On the other hand, half of the respondents from Africa, 43% from countries in transition and as many as 70% from Latin America were not satisfied with the police job in controlling crime.
It should be noted that government some times uses stringent measures on people who engage in mob justice.
This is not likely to solve the problem. The New Vision of Tuesday, June 25, 2002 reported that six convicts of mob justice were sentenced to death by the High Court in Jinja.
Although people who carry out mob justice should be punished to deter others from committing the same crime, Government should not use the death penalty on such people. It should rather use other forms of punishment like life imprisonment.
Mob justice is a crime like any other and should be eliminated. This, however, should be through a concerted effort of all the stakeholders including the Police, the judiciary, the media, Government and human rights organisations and activists. Criminal behaviour is a product of extremely complex societal and personality factors that can be neither corrected nor deterred by law enforcement alone.
Not only is the total Police job a complex one, literary without boundaries, but also in many ways it is thankless and dangerous.
A lot of education and awareness campaigns are needed for the general population to understand that mob justice is not only wrong but illegal and punishable by law. People must be taught that all societies experience crime and evil, but eliminating those who engage in those crimes does not automatically solve the problem.
It should be the work of human rights activists to ensure that communities are sensitised about mob justice. People must be educated that wrong-doers also need a chance to live and probably reform.
The criminal justice process is generally expected to reform or rehabilitate those caught up in it or at least not make them worse.
Communities should be able to recognise that virtually all persons who are sentenced to imprisonment eventually return to community and become law-abiding citizens. This is the corrective function of punishment. People who are lynched are never given this chance of self-realisation and reform.
The liberal principals, which permit the state to punish, must not merely show that punishment achieves some good, but that it is a proper task of the state to pursue that good by these means. Communities may therefore cause harm (through mob justice) in order to prevent the greater harms that would otherwise be caused by crime.
Improving lives in society includes righting the wrongs committed, but given the unfairness of mob justice we may be piling on new wrongs rather than addressing the old ones.
The writer is a student of M.A. Human Rights at Makerere University