MPs: Death penalty not the answer

 TWO Opposition MPs have denounced the death penalty as harsh and inhuman.

Tobias Kulang (Kundiawa-Gembogl) and Bire Kimisopa (Goroka) told Parliament yesterday that while they supported imposing stringent penalties for serious crimes, the death penalty was not the answer.

The amendment to the Criminal Code Act was tabled in Parliament by Minister for Justice and Attorney-General Kerenga Kua. 

Kimisopa said: “The Government cannot legislate morality or man for that matter. 

“Only God changes the heart of a person to understand right from wrong. 

“To change attitude by killing a person will achieve nothing. 

“We must find out about the cause and origin of the problems first before we can understand how to deal with them through the laws we create.”

He said imposing the death penalty by amending the Criminal Code Act was a knee-jerk reaction by the Government. 

Kulang said the Government needed to spend more time in finding out the root causes of the problem because the Government could not start killing people when it had not done its part to assist people, resulting in them resorting to serious crimes. 

“I support the idea of stronger penalties but I do not support death penalty,” he said. 

“We must spend more time as legislators and find out why there is lack of moral conscience that such happen in our society before we can impose the death penalty. 

“It is important to back-track and understand where the problem arises from and what caused it to see if we have played our part in supporting the needs of the people before we legislate to kill. 

“So I think it is not time to enforce the death penalty.”