The Malaysian Bar wants Putrajaya to walk the talk and do away with the mandatory death penalty, irrespective of offences.

"The Malaysian Bar urges the government - if it is indeed determined in this regard - to table a Bill in the current session of Parliament to put an end to the mandatory death penalty...," said Bar president George Varughese in a statement today.

Varughese lamented that the government has made announcements on doing away with the mandatory death penalty, but no concrete action had followed.

"We regret that despite the government’s repeated announcements over the past several years that it had been looking into abolishing the mandatory death penalty, no draft legislation has yet been tabled," he said.

Yesterday, Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Azalina Othman Said said the cabinet agreed to amend the colonial-era Dangerous Drugs Act of 1952 to give

Varughese said the proposal should not be limited to drug offences.

"The Malaysian Bar is of the view that the death penalty should be removed for all offences, irrespective of the crime that may have been committed," he said.

Varughese said the imposition of the mandatory death penalty ties the hands of judges when it comes to sentencing, and diminishes their role as judges.

"It prevents them from considering the manifold mitigating factors and distinctive circumstances that surround each case, before sentencing," he said.

He said these factors include, but are not limited to, the offender's age, past criminal record, mental capacity, use of violence, and reparations made.

Varughese said justice would not be served if these factors were not weighed in before the sentence was handed down.

"The death penalty has no place in a society that values human life, justice, and mercy," he said.

The bar also wants Putrajaya to stay any pending executions, declare an official moratorium on the use of the death penalty, and commute every death sentence to that of life imprisonment, in the current parliamentary session.