President Yoweri Museveni was under mounting pressure...

President Yoweri Museveni was under mounting pressure from church groups and human rights activists to pardon the 271 inmates on death row at the Luzira Maximum Prison, outside the capital city of Kampala.Spearheading the campaign, Cardinal Emmanuel Wamala, head of the Roman Catholic Church in Uganda, has urged the government to consider the plight of the inmates on the death row languishing in prisons. "For them, the year 2000 is a year of hope, hope for release, so that they can return to their own," he said.The campaign is being backed by rights groups. "We are appealing to the president to pardon these people because the death penalty is degrading and does not help someone to reform," said Apollo Kakaire of the Kampala-based Foundation for Human Rights Initiative (FHRI).Prisoners on the death row include former politicians in both presidents Idi Amin's regime (1971-1979) and Milton Obote's government (1980-1985) and some of them have been languishing at Luzira for more than 20 years. Anglican Archbishop Livingstone Mpalanyi Nkoyooyo appealed to Museveni to pardon Amin's former governor Abdullah Nassur, Obote's former minister Chris Rwakasisi, and other condemned prisoners at Luzira. The appeal by rights and religious groups came at a time when the government has dismissed a recommendation by the Uganda Law Reform Commission to abolish the death penalty. After carrying out a study, the Commission, along with other lawyers, had advised the government to abolish capital punishment, arguing that prisoners should be given a chance at rehabilitation.