TITLE:
Public Attitudes towards Death Penalty Provisions: Relevance of Ethico-Phenomenological Principles in the Operation of Articles 3 (3) & 19 (2) of the 1992 Republican Constitution of Ghana
AUTHORS:
Joseph Cudjoe Awudja, Ronald Osei Mensah, Adwoa Kwegyiriba, Agyemang Frimpong
KEYWORDS:
Abolitionists, Capital Punishment, Constitution, Death Penalty, Ethics, Retentionists
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Social Sciences,
Vol.9 No.12,
December
7,
2021
ABSTRACT: The death penalty is a form of capital punishment instituted by the
constitution which requires that certain crimes as dictated by the law are punished by death. This survey specifically examines the role of ethics
in public consideration of the death penalty provisions in the context of
abolitionist/retentionist debate. This research employed a qualitative design
and was guided by three which include: to
examine the justification offered by people who expressed standards on death
penalty, among others. A sample size of 300 respondents were randomly and conveniently sampled
from the 37 military interdenominational churches and stratified
into three strata of Kanda-Estates, Nima 441 area, and Mamobi and questionnaire
administered. The results indicate that compared to the hard-core supporters of
the death penalty, those who considered retributionism held more value
conflicts around deterrence and capital punishment for some crimes, whereas
those who considered rehabilitationism held more value conflicts among
reformation and those who preferred reconstructionism had conflicts around all
major crimes. This research emphatically recommends that the death penalty be
abolished under the new constitution and replaced with life imprisonment
without parole. It also recommends that any amendment to abolish the death
penalty be approved by a national referendum, as it involved an entrenched
constitutional provision.