ABSTRACT: * Sanou Baworo SEYDOU - Burkina Faso: in November 1993 African parliamentarians founded the League of African Parliamentarians for the abolition of the death penalty in the world by the Year 200.

* Basile GUISSOU - Burkina Faso: "On the basis of my experience as a man of power and then a victim, I have learnt that each life is equal, and that encouraging violence, even with silence, means doing violence to oneself".

* Elhadji Allélé HABIBOU - Niger; In Africa there are other looming death penalties: illiteracy, poverty, desertification.

* The Right Reverend Cyril PILLAY - South Africa: Nelson Mandela has declared that the death penalty will be completely abolished with the new Government.

* Ibrahim FALL - Senegal: Black African, pre-Islamic and pre-Colonial societies, which are unfairly labeled as barbarian societies, ignored the very existence of capital punishment. The conquest and the spread of Islam has imposed the Charia on Africa.

* Mollé MOLLE' - Ivory Coast: the death penalty creates as many victims as AIDS and malaria do.

* Rindandi DJONKAMLA - Camerun: The basis of the social contract and of the onset of the law is the deprivation of the "freedom" to kill another human being.

("HANDS OFF CAIN", 1 February 1994)

There can be no abolition of capital punishment without the affirmation of democracy. There has been no contrary opinion in the African representatives at the Brussels Congress. The name of the association, Hands Off Cain, was instead criticized: its evocative power supposedly applies only to the Judaico-Christian cultures. The congress decision, nonetheless, leaves the regional abolitionist associations free to choose the most suitable name and the forms of organization to let themselves be known.

Sanou Baworo Seydou - Burkina Faso

MP, vice president of the League of African Parliamentarians

The founder congress is a premiere that deserves all the consideration due to an international convergence on a subject such as the right to life and the life of rights.

It has taken place at a moment in which issues such as the death penalty and the right to life are ever more uptodate. We need only consider the tragic events that are taking place in several regions of the world. Increasingly, violence is used as a means to settle social and political contradictions, in violation of every humanitarian principle.

The Brussels congress represented, above all, the desire to unite the consciences and provides the means and juridical references to operate and implement a fundamental right: the right not to be killed following a sentence or a judicial measure.

To that end, in November 1993 the African parliamentarians founded the African Parliamentarians' League for the abolition of the death penalty by the Year 200, with the objective of "carrying out an awareness-raising campaign with the African populations and bodies and to operate at the level of the African Parliamentarians with a view to adopting laws that abolish the death penalty where it is still in force". The African Parliamentarians participated in the Brussels congress in a constructive way, presenting and supporting positions aiming to the objective of enhancing the reflection and the exchange of different experiences.

The will, shown by the Congress, of linking the foundation of the international league to the Judaico-Christian tradition is clearly commendable, but the change of its name exclusively in the sense of this tradition raised considerable reservations. In the black African context, the reference to Cain makes no sense, since there is nothing similar in our tradition, where the death penalty does not exist as a punishment.

For these reasons I agree on the congress conclusions on the free choice on the part of the regional abolitionist associations to maintain the names and the specific objectives they have given themselves.

Basile Guissou - Burkina Faso

former foreign minister, promoter of the "League of African Parliamentarians"

After being a member of Government in my capacity as Minister for Foreign Affairs, I was imprisoned for three months, from 16 December 1987 to 25 March 1988. Marco Pannella came to Ouagadougou and organized a vast campaign to obtain my release.

Since then I have been actively promoting the non-violent struggle for the defense of the right to life and the life of rights, so much that a parliamentary league now exists that gathers the African parliamentarians to struggle against the death penalty.

From my experience as a government official and then a victim of the power, I have drawn the lesson that every life is equal, and that encouraging violence, even with silence, is like attracting it on oneself. I was part of a government that applied torture against citizens until I experienced it myself. Struggling for non-violence and the abolition of the death penalty means struggling for oneself. Whatever the conditions, violence is always degrading: when one its constantly posed in front of the possibility of living and dying one experiences degradation. The death penalty has not always been in effect in Burkina Faso. It existed before the colonization, because Burkina Faso was born from a empire that lasted ten centuries. Emperor Muada established the death penalty in virtue of his authority. It cannot be said that it was introduced starting from its contacts with Islam, or, after that, with the French colonization.

After the independence of 1960, capital punishment was maintained in the various constitutions - this is now the fourth - but it has been applied only once, in 1974, against a civil guard who had killed a cashier during a robbery.

The last constitution, that was voted in 1991, does not mention the death penalty. It does not specify whether it is abolished or envisioned. Since what is not forbidden is allowed, our struggle aims to obtain a law that abolish the death penalty in Burkina Faso - where two people have been in the death row for five years - and in the other African countries.

Elhadji Allélé Habibou - Niger

MP, president of the League of African Parliamentarians

Our Constitution does not pronounce itself on the death penalty, but on a certain number of citizens' rights, and on the institution of pardon in the case of capital punishment, which is up to the President of the Republic.

In Africa we are generally in favour of a democratic state and of the affirmation of the right to life and the life of rights: that is why we are struggling to obtain the abolition of the death penalty. Moreover, in Africa there are other death penalties that loom: illiteracy, poverty, desertification. That is why it is necessary to gather all parliamentarians of all Africa to safeguard the rights of man and the democratic state.

In Niger, precisely because a democratic state has been established, where all convicted citizens must be tried by a court and benefit from the right to be legally represented, it has become difficult to "get rid" of political dissidents.

The creation of the African Parliamentarians' League for the Abolition of the death penalty represents a breakthrough in this sense.

When parliamentarians from all over the world will associate among themselves and with people with other competences - jurists, men of culture - for instance a collaboration with institutions such as the U.N. or the African League, it will be possible to achieve if not the abolition by the year 2000, at least satisfactory results by that date.

The Right Reverend Cyril Pillay - South Africa

MP

I am a pastor of the Church, a member of Parliament and the spokesman of the justice department of the party of solidarity. I joined the campaign for the abolition of the death penalty when I participated last year in the radical party's congress in Rome.

I firmly believe the death penalty is not a deterrent; in many countries where it is in effect, the number of homicides has considerably increased with respect to countries where the death penalty has been abolished. In South Africa there is a problem with racism. All magistrates except two are white. There are 288 people in the death row who await their destiny.

On 2 February 1990, the president of South Africa imposed a moratorium on the death penalty, and on 17 June 1993 the government of South Africa proposed a resolution to Parliament which was then rejected. Last month Nelson Mandela, president of the ANC, declared that with the new government the death penalty would be completely abolished. Thus, as a representative of the abolitionist campaign in South Africa, I have been operating in Parliament where, on 17 June 1993, we beat the government and its resolution against the moratorium.

In South Africa the death penalty was applied mainly for crimes of homicide and rape. The government, which declares to oppose homicide, commits legalized homicides. The method adopted is hanging.

I firmly oppose the so-called people's tribunals. In a civilized society such as South Africa, the law and the public order must prevail in the respect of the law. Those who do justice on their own or pronounce death sentences, burning people alive or hanging them, commit an actual crime.

The vast majority of South African populations is in favour of abolishing the death penalty. The blacks, who have always been oppressed by a white and minority government, have had to struggle to survive and affirm their freedom, peace and justice. This has then led many black parties to armed struggle, and they have often carried our attempts during state meetings, during which innocent victims have died.

Parliament is about to pass a draft provisional constitution, and on 27 April there will be our first democratic elections. From then on an abolitionist campaign will need to develop in South Africa to obtain that the death penalty not be included in the future legislation.

Ibrahim Fall - Senegal

MP

In Black Africa the death penalty has appeared only recently, historically speaking. For a long time the traditional societies had ignored this penalty included among those applied in the case of violation of the rules of community life. The penalties, within the family group and within vaster communities, were various and extremely persuasive. There were penalties in kind, for instance, agricultural obligations of collective interest or - in the most common cases - the offer to the victim of a certain number of cattle heads. In the more serious cases, there was ousting, temporary or final exclusion from the community. For non-members of the community, for instance in the case of military defeats, the penalties ranged from the obligation - imposed by the victors - to pay taxes or perhaps the imprisonment of the vanquished.

Neo-African, pre-Islamic, pre-colonial societies mistakenly labeled as barbaric, ignored the very existence of the death penalty. The conquest and spread of Islam imposed the Charia in Africa. Despite this, the death penalty has been seldom applied. It was the European colonization - the famous civilizing mission, with its military and judges - that imposed the death penalty.

After independence, African countries organized according to the practices of a modern administration. But capital punishment was applied especially for political reasons. In Senegal, in 33 years, it has happened only twice: after an attempt against the Head of State and to punish the assassination of a minister. In other countries it is used only in cases of conspiracy, when the security of the state is in jeopardy and in the event of a coup d'état to eliminate political dissidents.

The African Parliament, which belongs to a civilization which has never applied the death penalty, has the duty of participating in a campaign to request its suppression.

I would like to add a personal remark. When talking about human rights, and the safeguard of these rights, it is important to signal that half of humanity is sentenced to a slow death by the other half of humanity, the richer one. It is a problem that should not leave us indifferent. When, as in Africa, the population is subjected to poverty, ignorance and disease for the simple fact that it does mot manage to sell its products at a price allowing to finance health care and education, a crime against humanity is being committed. Our struggle should be shared also by the death penalty abolitionists.

Mollé Mollé - Ivory Coast

MP, founder member of the International League

According to Amnesty International's data, between 1985 and 1988 Asia killed 1791 prisoners, Africa 1372, Europe 119, America 118. These figures do not take into account the extrajudicial executions and the ones that have not been notified. They prove, moreover, that Africa and Asia are the two continents where the highest number of citizens are killed. The 743 executions of Iran, the 537 of South Africa, the 500 of China and the 439 of Nigeria, have take place in totalitarian regimes: we can say that the less a country is democratic the more it resorts to the death penalty. Our organization must struggle against totalitarian regimes and take sides with the young democracies. Many African countries struggle to affirm democracy and thus the death penalty - considering the high number of victims its produces - should be considered the equivalent of a social plague, like AIDS or malaria.

Rindandi Djonkamla - Camerun

MP

The debate on the death penalty is not a philosophical quarrel, but a dramatic and extremely concrete problem that imbues the actions of our daily lives.

It is not only a statistic problem or a question of instruments, but a moral problem, that has to do with feelings and dignity. The honour of being men is at stake in it.

A serious debate on the death penalty calls for an answer on the juridical foundations of our society. The basis of the social contract and the onset of the law is the privation of the "freedom" to kill other men. Otherwise expressed, the genesis of the law lies in the refusal of violent death. The principle of the law is the right to life through the establishment of a civil society, finally freed from barbarianism.

It is inconceivable for a society that is founded on the refusal of barbarianism to accept through the death penalty its transformation into legal barbarity. The death penalty has the same relationship with the political body as cancer to the individual body: none has ever evoked the need for the cancer.