03 Feb 2021

Judicial officers have been urged to apply the law regarding the death penalty as it currently stands. 

Speaking February 2 during the opening of the legal year in Gaborone, Attorney General, Advocate Abraham Keetshabe pointed out that the nation had agreed that the punishment for unlawfully taking away another person’s life was death. 

He said the platform on which the nation stood in relation to the death penalty was in the law which should therefore be applied in appropriate cases.

“Both the judicial oath and the existing law place a judicial officer in the position of a trustee and in that regard members of the public are entitled to trust that in appropriate cases, a sentence of death will be passed without hesitation,” he said.

Advocate Keetshabe said he had no doubt that the country’s transparent judicial system was sufficiently equipped to remain impartial and to convict murder accused persons in appropriate cases and to sentence them to death.

 Quoting Court of Appeal ruling by Justice Lesetedi in the case of Director of Public Prosecutions versus Freeman Mapukule, he stated that “…It is the duty of the judge to uphold, vindicate and apply the law as prescribed statute and not to detract from it…”

“Let it be true that murderers should, without exception, face the true and accurate consequences of their actions or inactions,” he said.

Advocate Keetshabe described Botswana as a unique country saying it should retain its unique originality.ends