Death penalty is part of Singapore’s multi-pronged approach in fight against drugs: Shanmugam

SINGAPORE: The death penalty for drug traffickers is “not the solution that solves all the problems”, it is part of Singapore’s total anti-drug framework that also includes rehabilitating abusers, said Home Affairs and Law Minister K Shanmugam on Thursday (Oct 26).

“You have to focus on reducing supply and the death penalty comes within the context of trying to reduce the supply by making it clear to traffickers that if they get caught, they will face the death penalty,” said Mr Shanmugam at the opening of the second Asia-Pacific Forum Against Drugs.

“I have said repeatedly, (we) do not take any joy or comfort in having the death penalty, and nobody hopes or wants to have it imposed,” he added. “We do it reluctantly, on the basis that it is for the greater good of society … it saves more lives. That is the rationale on which we have it.”

Mr Shanmugam said traffickers know that the likelihood of being caught and prosecuted is “quite high”.

“So the stakes are made very clear upfront. And that I think has a very powerful influence on those who seek to traffic drugs into Singapore.”

CALL FOR RESPONSIBLE ADVOCACY

Mr Shanmugam noted that there have been growing calls from activists and “well-funded campaigns” around the world, including in Singapore, for a softer stance against drugs. These activists present the argument that it is medically acceptable to use drugs or propose policies to decriminalise drug use.

“In our view that is reckless, irresponsible, it’s a cop-out and it’s a step backward,” said Mr Shanmugam. “It will worsen the problem, it has worsened the problem in the countries that have taken these steps.”

Speaking to an audience of more than 200 local and foreign delegates from government, non-governmental organisations and civil society groups, Mr Shanmugam cited Colorado in the United States as an example of where legalisation of drugs has “gone wrong”.

“They had found that there were suddenly a lot of drivers who were driving under the influence of drugs, and a lot of them were dying in accidents … nobody counts these costs,” said the minister.

“So I would ask the death penalty abolitionists to go and study the places where laws have been relaxed, places where drugs have been legalised, find out what has happened and look at the number of deaths that have taken place in society, and then come back and let’s talk.”

"ROMANTICISING" THOSE IN DRUG TRADE

In Singapore, Mr Shanmugam pointed out that some have been trying to sway public opinion of the death penalty by “romanticising individuals who have been involved in the drug trade”.

“What they do not focus on are the thousands of people whose lives are ruined, whose families are ruined,” he said, adding that the Singapore Government and agencies are “happy and prepared” to debate the issue with the death penalty abolitionists at any forum.

Mr Shanmugam also cited figures to show that the drug problem in East Asia and Southeast Asia is worsening. 

"The proportion of ketamine seized in this region as a proportion of what was seized in the world, in 2010 it was 65 per cent, in 2015 it was 97 per cent," he said.

Seizures of heroin have also increased while hundreds of new psychoactive substances were produced between 2009 and 2016, he added.

Source: Channel News Asia, October 26, 2017

Once a Jolly Hangman, Singapore Justice in the Dock

The government of Singapore does not want anyone to read this book.

When it was first published in Singapore, police raided [author] Alan Shadrake's hotel room and arrested him. He was taken into custody and interrogated for two full days and two sleepless nights, then charged with contempt of court by "scandalising the judiciary".

As Shadrake awaited trial, he discovered to his discomfort just what happens when a person challenges the Singapore system. He was followed everywhere. Journalist friends reacted with alarm if Shadrake called them from his mobile, concerned that their association with him would then be known to the police. They knew, although at first he did not, that his mobile phone was bugged by the police. Most local journalists did not have the stomach to be seen as opponents of the regime.

His trial in the Singapore Supreme Court started on Monday, 18 October 2010. At the heart of the prosecution was the allegation that Shadrake had committed contempt of court by saying (and, it must be said, illustrating by example) that there was "something sinister: how the Singapore legal system works in secret and how politics, international trade and business often determine who lives and who dies on the gallows". The examples he gives in "Once a Jolly Hangman" point fairly strongly in support of that conclusion.

Shadrake's book is about the use of capital punishment in Singapore.

Singapore justifies its use of capital punishment on utilitarian grounds: the government says that the drug problem in Singapore would be much worse if those caught smuggling drugs, as [Australian drug mule] Van Nguyen was, were not killed by the State. How curious then that this logic dose not extend to cases where Singapore's diplomatic or trade interests are involved.

This is the puzzle Shadrake's book seeks to answer. Singapore's response suggests that the answer has hit a raw nerve. 

-- Julian Burnside, QC, Foreword to the new edition, Melbourne, 2011.

Singapore, one of the highest per capita rates of execution of any country worldwide

Once dubbed by The Economist as the world execution capital, Singapore is believed to have one of the highest per capita rates of execution of any country worldwide, thus remaining totally out of step in the move regionally and internationally towards a death penalty-free world. A historic momentum is building from which Singapore chooses to exclude itself.

The UN's 2008 resolution calling for a worldwide moratorium on executions as a step towards total abolition has been heeded by an increasing number of countries. Not so by Singapore, however. Over 420 people have been executed there since 1991, mostly for drug trafficking, for which there is a mandatory death sentence [see update here]. A number of countries have mounted protests against the execution of their nationals in Singapore and cases have been raised at the highest level.

Once a Jolly Hangman unearths new or little-known information. The author argues convincingly that only the cases with possible negative political or economic outcomes appear to have succeeded in preventing executions of foreign nationals. In contrast, he exposes the pitiful, hopeless situation of poor, uneducated or desperate drug mules with no important connections. 

-- Margaret John, Coordinator for Singapore and Malaysia, Amnesty International Canada, Foreword to the original edition.

➤ Click here to read two selected excerpts from Alan Shadrake's Once a Jolly Hangman.

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"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted." -- Oscar Wilde