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South
Africa
Archbishop calls for
Abu-Jamal retrial
Panafrican
News Agency April 26, 2024
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) -
South
African church leaders Wednesday focused on the escalating call
for a halt to the execution of Philadelphia death-row prisoner,
Mumia Abu-Jamal, and on a global need to commit to restorative
justice.
An
inter-faith church service on Robben Island, off Cape Town, coincided
with the opening of a poster exhibition of art dedicated to Abu-Jamal.
The
aim of this show — which is travelling to galleries throughout
South Africa, Europe, and the US — is to escalate international
pressure for a retrial.
Anglican
Archbishop Njongonkulu Ndugane said Robben Island was the appropriate
venue for the event "for it was here where reconciliation in South
Africa was nurtured in its infancy."
"At
stake, of course is more than a new trial for Abu-Jamal and racist
justice. The issue is whether we human beings have the right to
condemn another to death," he said.
Serious
questions have arisen about Abu-Jamal's trial and the evidence
used against him. The former radio journalist has been in solitary
confinement for most of his imprisonment since 1982.
Known
as "the voice of the voiceless," Abu-Jamal was a leading critic
of police violence against minority communities in Philadelphia.
He was convicted of killing a white police officer, and sentenced
to death. He has written extensively from his jail cell against
the wars in Iraq, Kosovo and Colombia, and also about the racism
of the American judicial system.
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