THE death of six-year-old Orlando Jaikarran has left Guyana grieving. President Irfaan Ali’s response, that the death penalty must be examined and that he backs it “100%,” is not an outrage. A society unable to name any crime as beyond the pale has lost its moral compass, and the public’s revulsion this week is the compass working.
Honesty about the argument matters, though. This case cannot rest on deterrence. A National Research Council review in 2012 found that existing research is not useful in determining whether the death penalty increases, decreases, or has no effect on homicide rates. Anyone promising that the gallows will stop child killings oversells. Anyone claiming deterrence is disproven overreaches too. The real case is about proportionality: punishment should answer the gravity of the crime, and for the deliberate killing of a child, many Guyanese believe nothing less expresses the community’s judgment. That belief is democratic. Attorney General Anil Nandlall has argued in court that retaining the penalty manifests the will of the Guyanese people exercising their sovereignty, and the Court of Appeal has declined to declare capital punishment unconstitutional.
The more uncomfortable truth is that Guyana already has this penalty and does not use it. Parliament in 2010 partially abolished the mandatory death penalty for murder, and the last hanging was in August 1997. A punishment that exists on paper but is never carried out serves neither deterrence nor justice. It leaves prisoners in limbo, and Amnesty International has recorded cases where death-row inmates had sentences commuted after 16 to 24 years because the delay itself was cruel and inhuman treatment. The Privy Council’s Pratt and Morgan ruling already holds that a death sentence cannot be carried out more than five years after it is imposed. Governments that keep the law but avoid its consequences are practising theatre.
The President was right to add that the judicial process must take its course. Bharrat Jaikarran is reportedly in custody and has reportedly admitted to the killing, but he is entitled to a trial. Here the abolitionists’ strongest argument deserves respect: executions cannot be undone. That risk is answered only by building a system worthy of the stakes. Yet Stabroek News has observed that the jury system has virtually collapsed and a conviction and a death sentence are rarities. If Guyana wants the ultimate penalty available, it must first fund forensic capacity, competent legal aid, timely trials and swift appeals. Without them, the penalty would be applied arbitrarily or not at all.
Mr. Nandlall’s review should therefore be public and bounded. It should ask whether a narrow category, such as the premeditated murder of a child, can meet the strictest evidentiary standard and survive constitutional scrutiny, and it should invite genuine consultation rather than a rubber stamp. If the answer is no, the government should say so plainly and legislate meaningful life sentences instead, so that “life” means life.
Whatever is decided, the debate must not become a substitute for protecting living children. Sentences follow harm. Child protection services, domestic-violence intervention and community vigilance prevent it. Orlando was reported missing on October 14. The nation owes him more than anger. It owes him a justice system that is certain, swift and honest, whatever penalty it finally prescribes.
