It has been 13 long years since Shahrul Izani Suparman had a decent birthday. The soon-to-be 32-year-old was sentenced to the gallows at age 24, after a borrowed motorcycle he was riding was found stashed with cannabis.

For 13 years, Shahrul Izani has maintained he did not know the drugs were stashed in the basket of the motorcycle - wrapped in sheets of newspaper, placed in a plastic bag and hidden from view under a jacket.

“Amnesty International Malaysia has been campaigning for Shahrul Izani to be spared hanging since late 2014. Last year, we upped the ante when Amnesty International selected Shahrul Izani as one of the people whose story we shared with the rest of the world,” AI Malaysia executive director Shamini Darshni said.

Amnesty International selected Shahrul Izani as a campaign case for the World Day Against Death Penalty, which falls on Oct 10 every year.

Shahrul Izani was arrested in 2003 at just over 18, and sentenced to death in 2009. The judge in his case had no choice but to hand down the death penalty as drug offences carry a mandatory hanging sentence.

Currently, Shahrul is awaiting for his clemency application to be heard before the state Pardons Board, where he hopes that his sentence would be commuted or he would receive a pardon.

“On 9 March 2016, Shahrul turns 32. To help him celebrate his birthday, AI Malaysia is launching a ‘Wish #ShahrulIzani Happy Birthday’ campaign to encourage Malaysians to bring him some joy.

“The aim of this campaign is to give a young man hope, especially when hope, to him, is in short supply. For a man who is forced to listen to a fellow death row inmate struggle to breathe his last when hanging from a rope, we hope that this action would bring him some small comfort,” Shamini said.

Shahrul Izani’s solitary confinement cell in Sungai Buloh Prison is located some metres away from the hanging spot, she elaborated.

“AI Malaysia believes that this course of action is a platform that will bring people together as a sign of solidarity not only to give Shahrul Izani hope but to also to send a strong signal to the authorities that the death penalty has no place in today’s society,” Shamini said.

Those wanting to participate in the campaign may purchase a birthday card and write a message for Shahrul Izani. Completed birthday cards should be posted to AI Malaysia at D-2-33A, 8 Avenue, Jalan Sungai Jernih 8/1, Section 8, 46050 Petaling Jaya, Selangor, Malaysia, which will act as a collection centre.

E-cards with a message to Shahrul Izani should be sent to aimalaysia@aimalaysia.org .

“We hope that the birthday greetings will encourage Shahrul Izani and his family and show them that we have not forgotten him and will continue to stand with him.

“On another level, AI Malaysia also hopes that this campaign will drive home the point that the death penalty solves no crime, nor will it deter drugs from the market or prevent other crimes from happening,” Shamini said.

AI Malaysia is also encouraging people to download a photo tag of a specialised birthday greeting to Shahrul Izani from http://amnesty.my . Once this photo tag is downloaded, members of the public are encouraged to take selfies or a wefies with the photo tag and post it on any or all of the social media platforms with the hashtag #ShahrulIzani.

Online petition

“We are also asking people to sign an online petition at http://amnesty.my/shahrul to urge the Selangor Clemency Board to commute Shahrul Izani’s death sentence to life imprisonment as he faces the risk of execution at any time.”

While Malaysia remained among 11 countries in 2015 that used the death penalty, Shamini noted that there has been an encouraging development where the government was considering abolishing the mandatory death penalty and returning death sentencing discretion to the judges in death penalty cases.

“Numerous studies have been carried out to weigh the effects of the death penalty for drug related offences. The result isn’t as overwhelming as one would expect it to be - the death penalty has proven to be ineffective in reducing crime, including drug-related offences,” Shamini said.

“We strongly urge the government to immediately put in place a moratorium on the use of capital punishment before the law to abolish the mandatory death penalty has been passed. Perhaps then, more Shahrul Izanis can be spared the torture of living on borrowed time,” she said.