"Death sentence is necessary to make people charier of committing corruption," Farhan Hamid said.Jakarta (ANTARA News) - Deputy Speaker of the Indonesian People`s Consultative Assembly (MPR) Ahmad Farhan Hamid said he supports the slapping of death sentences for corruption convicts.
"Death sentence is necessary to make people charier of committing corruption," Farhan told a dialog on justice for corruption convicts."
A legal system is needed to be supported by strong political will to mete out death sentence for corruption convicts, he said.
Meanwhile, criminal law expert from the University of Indonesia Akhiar Salmi said corruption convict deserve death sentence.
Akhiar, however, doubts that Indonesian courts have enough courage to slap the heaviest penalty of death on corruption convicts.
Corruption is categorized as extraordinary crime against humanity in Indonesia, but punishment is relatively lenient.
Akhiar said corruption convicts are generally hedonists who care less about how much they hurt other people, but they are more scared of death.
"Death sentence would make people to think twice before committing corruption," he said, adding without the scare of death we would never win the battle against corruption.
He said corruption remain rampant in the country as the punishments for convicts are too lenient.
He said the legal system could not be upheld if enforcement officials do not support and have no courage to give death sentence.
He said on public pressure , the House of Representatives put a chapter "on death sentence for corruption convicts" in the Law No.31 of 1999 , but "it is not meant to be serious."
"The chapter says `death sentence could be imposed on certain condition.` When the certain condition would come," he queried.(*)
Editor: Heru Purwanto
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