Tanzania still retains the death penalty as one of punishments under...

Tanzania still retains the death penalty as one of the punishments under the Penal Code and the National Defence Act. There are three offences punishable by the death sentence: murder, treason and misconduct of commanders or any military service man in the presence of an enemy.
The last execution was carried out in 1994 and 21 men were hanged. The de facto moratorium is exercised under the President’s prerogative. Over the past decade, hundreds of death sentences were commuted to life imprisonment by the President.
In Tanzania there is an ongoing Constitutional Review process. However, the draft which was revealed on 3 June 2013 failed to say anything with regard to the abolishment of the death penalty. According to the draft, every person has the right to live and be protected by the society in accordance with the law.
On 9 September 2013, then Minister of Justice and Constitution Affairs Mathias Chikawe proposed that the death penalty be removed in the new Constitution. He said life imprisonment should be an alternative to enable criminals to change their behaviour. Chikawe said sometimes innocent people were executed…. with life imprisonment, such innocent souls could be saved. Minister Chikawe said he had hoped the Draft Constitution would state clearly that every person has the right to live and make sure that the right isn’t violated through laws that impose the death penalty on Tanzanians. He stressed that he still hope that the final document will call for its abolition.
In Tanzania death penalty is only passed by the High Court. Free legal aid service is provided to accused persons facing charges that attract death penalty to ensure that in the process of trial the accused is legally represented. A person sentenced to death by the High Court has an automatic right of appeal to the Court of Appeal which is the highest Court in Tanzania. Once a death sentence is passed and confirmed by the Court of Appeal there is an Advisory Committee on the prerogative of mercy which advises the President with regard to the execution of the sentence. In advising the President, the Committee considers the views of the relatives of both the victim and the convict, including the convict’s own petition for mercy to the Committee. In addition to the Committee, also the sentencing Court is requested to submit a written report on the case to the President. These mechanisms mostly provide a safeguard against arbitrary execution of the death penalty. The de facto moratorium is exercised under the President’s prerogative.
In 2011, the UN Human Rights Committee noted that the country has in place a de facto moratorium on the death penalty since 1994, while expressing concern about the large number of individuals on death row and about the large numbers of death sentences which continue to be imposed by courts. The Committee regretted the “lack of sufficient information on the length of time that convicted persons have spent on death row, their treatment in detention, and the procedures in place for the commutation of the death sentences in the light of the moratorium.” The Committee recommended that Tanzania commute all death sentences, take into account abolition becoming a party to the Second Optional Protocol to the ICCPR, and assure that prisoners do not face maltreatment. Hon. Mathias Chikawe, who represented Tanzania in Geneva, was openly quoted in the Tanzania 2011 Universal Periodic Review report as follows: “Research shows that public opinion is still divided on the appropriateness of the death penalty as the majority of the people are retentionists.....Tanzania has not acceded to the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights”.
However, the LHRC managed to carry out an opinion poll on the death penalty among professionals and citizens (1,500 people were interviewed) from different parts of the country. The study shows that 76% of the people interviewed admitted that death penalty is not a good punishment while 74% of the same group recommend life imprisonment as the best alternative to death penalty. The LHRC advised the State to address the public opinion in an open approach.
Records collected by the LHRC show that since independence in 1961, 238 people (232 men and 6 women) were executed after being convicted of murder. The number of executions between 1961 and 1995 amounted to 9.3 per cent of death row prisoners who were hanged.
The statistical information suggests that despite the executions that were carried out between 1961 and 1995, incidents of offences punishable by the death penalty were increasing and are still on the rise, from 46 convicts in 1961 to 2,562 in 2007. According to the LHRC, these statistics show that the death penalty is ineffective to curb capital crimes.
On 18 December 2014, Tanzania abstained from the Resolution on a Moratorium on the Use of the Death Penalty at the UN General Assembly such as in 2007, 2008, 2010 and 2012.