According to Kufour, everybody has the right to live, including criminals, saying "only God has the power to take a life”.
Former President John Agyekum Kufour has said that he is strongly against inmates being sentenced to death.
According to him, everybody has the right to live, including criminals, saying "only God has the power to take a life”.
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The ex-president never accepted to sign a death warrant for the execution of inmates condemned to death at the Nsawam Prisons during his time in office.
In his eight years as president, Mr. Kufour often granted pardon to convicts who were of good behavior, but never for once assented to a death sentence.
The 79-year-old believes the death penalty should be totally scrapped because it does not admonish value for human life.
“Personally, it has been against my conscience to take a life of another human being because I am influenced religiously…I am not the creator,” he said on Joy News’ latest hotline documentary “Death Row”.
He added that he is strongly against the death sentence, and would rather prefer that it is commuted to life imprisonment.
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This, he said, is necessary because sometimes innocent people could end up being executed due to a death sentence before they are proven not guilty.
“I believe the general trend across the world now is to commute the death sentence to life imprisonment. Other reasons can be found in humanitarianism and religion,” Mr. Kufour said, adding that “with modern science, people who have been condemned and sometimes awaiting execution have later been found to be innocent through DNA examinations and the likes”.
Kufour served as President of Ghana from January 2001 to January 2009.
According to Kufour, everybody has the right to live, including criminals, saying "only God has the power to take a life”. Read Full Story
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