P.M. says yes to death penalty, no to undue haste
The public’s desire to see a murderer swing from the gallows received a boost yesterday when Opposition Leader Dean Barrow publicly challenged the Prime Minister to abolish the criminal jurisdiction of the Privy Council. This would take the form of a constitutional amendment to make the Belize Court of Appeal the court of last resort in criminal matters. But while Barrow’s bolt from the blue may have energised the debate, Prime Minister Said Musa made it clear today that in matters of life and death there would be no rush to judgement.
Prime Minister Said Musa
“Well we are engaged in a process. As you may know, when I was in Guyana a few weeks ago at the CARICOM Summit, we took a decision, Belize together with the other countries of CARICOM to move ahead with abolishing the Privy Council and to give ultimate final jurisdiction to the Caribbean Court of Justice. What is now being proposed by Mr. Barrow, is that in the interim–as I understand it–we should move ahead with abolishing the Privy Council for criminal trials and allow our Court of Appeal to be the final court until the Caribbean Court of Justice comes into being. It’s a matter of about a year before that court will become operative. It’s a decision that Cabinet will have to consider carefully, but I did express to him that it is inline with the whole trend that we’re moving towards with the abolition of the Privy Council.”
Stewart Krohn
“But there is not going to be any rush then? In other words in the next sitting of the House we’re not gonna suddenly see this constitutional amendment brought up?”
Prime Minister Said Musa
“No, it won’t come up tomorrow. This is a matter that we have to give careful consideration to, it’s not something to take lightly. I know the mood of the people out there is hang them and hang them high and do it now. But we’re dealing with a matter of very serious jurisprudence here, we have to make sure that we do the right thing and we have to make sure that when we do it, it is properly done. An amendment that will have to come to the National Assembly will have to be carefully drafted to ensure that the objective is achieved.”
