On Wednesday, Malawi’s Supreme Court outlawed the death penalty ordering the re-sentencing of at least 37 people known to be under a death sentence (article available here). The court ruled that “the death penalty, since it is a derogation from the right to life, is impermissible” under the nation’s constitution.
“The essence of the right to life is life itself—the sanctity of life. The right to life is the mother of all rights. Without the right to life other rights do not exist,” the court reasoned. The decision means that life imprisonment is now the maximum sentence in Malawi, reserved only “for the worst instance of crime.”
No one has been executed in Malawi since 1975, the court wrote. The number of executions worldwide in 2020 was the lowest recorded by Amnesty International in the past decade. Indeed, Malawi’s high court observed in today’s decision that the death penalty “is against international human rights standards.”
Malawi is the 22nd country in sub-Saharan Africa to abolish the death penalty, following Chad’s abolition of capital punishment for all crimes last May.