COMMENT | Give reformed Pannir Selvam another chance
COMMENT | My heart and mind go out to P Pannir Selvam, a Malaysian in Changi Prison, Singapore, who is fighting the death penalty.
I was very surprised to read the news last week that Pannir had lost his appeal when his application for leave to challenge the public prosecutor’s refusal to issue him a Certificate of Substantive Assistance (CSA) was dismissed.
I understand that Pannir was denied the CSA even though he cooperated with the Central Narcotics Bureau (CNB) of Singapore, giving all the details that he possibly knew.
Personally, I would like to appeal for Pannir to be given a new trial. The death penalty is not an effective deterrent to crime.
As a Malaysian artiste, I feel responsible to talk on behalf of Pannir as I have worked on his songs together with the NGO Sebaran Kasih.
Pannir is a passionate songwriter...
COMMENT | My heart and mind go out to P Pannir Selvam, a Malaysian in Changi Prison, Singapore, who is fighting the death penalty.
I was very surprised to read the news last week that Pannir had lost his appeal when his application for leave to challenge the public prosecutor’s refusal to issue him a Certificate of Substantive Assistance (CSA) was dismissed.
I understand that Pannir was denied the CSA even though he cooperated with the Central Narcotics Bureau (CNB) of Singapore, giving all the details that he possibly knew.
Personally, I would like to appeal for Pannir to be given a new trial. The death penalty is not an effective deterrent to crime.
As a Malaysian artiste, I feel responsible to talk on behalf of Pannir as I have worked on his songs together with the NGO Sebaran Kasih.
Pannir is a passionate songwriter. I think that we, as artistes, and the music industry as a whole have a particular moral obligation to get involved and act as a platform to raise awareness on this serious issue that touches on a person's right to live.
The most barbaric condition of being on death row is the horrible feeling of uncertainty when one is under sentence of execution but doesn't know whether or when the sentence will be carried out. This is something difficult to digest.
Pannir’s uncertainty over the time of his execution is creating physical and mental pain amounting to add his death sentence.
Pannir's life is exactly as described in the song Arah Tuju which is about a prison inmate. The song targets youths with a message to avoid being involved in situations that could lead to being on death row.
Everybody has their destiny in life and Pannir's is to fight with death. Pannir and other death row prisoners are generally isolated from other prisoners, excluded from all the prison programmes, and sharply restricted in terms of visitation and exercise, spending as many as 23 hours a day alone in their cells.
If you are in a position to support the abolishment of the death penalty in the country, then please, use your voice for the voiceless.
For the defenceless, for the innocent, and for those that are convicted of minor drug offences and charged with the death penalty.
According to the deathpenaltyinfo.org website, in 2009, the President of Kenya had commuted the death sentences of all of the country’s death row prisoners, more than 4,000 of them, citing that the wait to face execution and death as “undue mental anguish and suffering”.
Let us look at what the Kenya government did and repeat it here.
Right now, Pannir and Nagaenthran K Dharmalingam, another Malaysian on death row in Changi prison who is reportedly intellectually challenged, are the two high profile cases. But there are a few other Malaysians in Singapore and many on death row in Malaysia.
I know that Malaysia can do the same for these people as well because regardless of how long the wait on death row is, the death penalty itself is a violation of human rights.
To lawmakers, members of the judiciary, and all persons in authority, my humblest and sincerest request to you is to please give Pannir Selvam a second chance to live.
He has been working hard from a dark place, the death row in prison to produce art for advocating and creating awareness for the abolishment of the death penalty. Those who know him say that he is a changed and reformed man.
Please at least reconsider his case and commute his death sentence.
SANTESH KUMAR is a recording artiste who advocates against the death penalty.
The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Malaysiakini.
