The Anti-Death Penalty Asia Network (ADPAN) welcomes the proposed bill by the Malaysian government  to abolish the mandatory death penalty. 

The mandatory death penalty deprives the court of the necessary discretion to hear and provide fair  punishment based on aggravating and mitigating circumstances which has consigned countless persons  who do not deserve the death penalty to death row. This is apparent when comparing the 1,324 death  row inmates to other countries in the Asia Pacific, such as Indonesia (355+), India (539+), and Thailand  (510+). Malaysia, for its size, has a significantly disproportionately high number of people on death row. 

Under international law, the death penalty can only be applied to the ‘most serious crime’, which has been  defined as the crime of intentionally killing. The abolition of the mandatory death penalty would bring  Malaysia closer in line with international standards for those countries that retain the death penalty.  Whilst Malaysia retains the death penalty, lawmakers must ensure that the principle of ‘most serious crime’  

will be the foundational policy to be applied by the Attorney General Chambers and other actors in  implementing the death penalty. 

The effectiveness of the death penalty as a deterrent is questionable at best. Research and expert opinions  have indicated that there are no effective nor functional means to evaluate the deterrent effect of the  death penalty on crime at a macro level. Furthermore, the abolition of the death penalty in several  countries was noted to have been followed by lower crime rates 1 . In Malaysia, the government has  maintained a moratorium on execution since May 2018, and the crime rate reports from the Depart of  Statistic Malaysia (DOSM) indicate that murder cases have consistently fallen over the past five years from  379 cases in 2017 to 243 cases in 2021. 

It should also be noted that public support for the death penalty has been relatively consistent. The survey  and research conducted by The Centre in 2019 and 2022 did not depart significantly from an earlier study  by Professor Roger Hood in 2013. There is no majority public support for the mandatory death penalty for  intentional murder. When presented with mitigating circumstances, the support for the mandatory death  penalty falls significantly2 . For drug offences, less than 20% of respondents expressed support for the  death penalty for the transport and sale of drugs, and this support fell based on mitigating factors and the  type of drugs involved3. 

Last but not least, there are significant indicators that demonstrate that the death penalty is counterproductive in that it supports or enables crime syndicates, especially for drug offences. The  executions of drug mules in Singapore have resulted in the execution of key witnesses who have had  significant information that could lead to the arrest of crime syndicates in Malaysia 4 . In the past, the  Singapore Minister of Law stated that the death penalty had kept the prices of drugs high and lowered  purity5. However, this has not changed the reality that the quantities of drugs supplied and consumed  remained relatively consistent. This suggeststhat drug syndicates are financially benefiting from increased  prices derived imposed by the perceived supply constraints imposed by the death penalty. 

Abolishing the mandatory death penalty represents a progressive step towards significant reform of the  criminal justice system. ADPAN calls on lawmakers to support this important move towards abolition.

1. ‘What Happens to Murder Rates when the Death Penalty is Scrapped? A Look at Eleven Countries Might Surprise  You’ (Abdorrahman Boroumand Center , 13 December 2018) https://www.iranrights.org/library/document/3501 2‘How do Malaysian really feel about the death penalty’ (The Center, 2019)  
2. https://app.centre.my/uploads/2020/06/Death-Penalty-Survey-Report-The-Centre-June-2020-compressed.pdf
3. 3 ‘How do Malaysians really feel about drugs’ (The Centre, July 2022)   https://app.centre.my/uploads/2020/06/Death-Penalty-Survey-Report-The-Centre-June-2020-compressed.pdf