LETTER: Death penalty shows who are the rogue states

The editorial, “Turkey shows how not to solve economic problems in SA” (December 6), refers. Our country is often compared with different states. Sometimes with good, democratic, progressive ones and sometimes plain rogue ones.

However, as shown in the editorial, some countries are so bad in many respects that no one wants to be compared with them. The best way to differentiate the good from the bad is to draw up a list of all 194 states that constitute the UN. Then separate them according to which ones persist with the death penalty and which ones have abolished it. The former will be classified as uncivilised for violating the ultimate human right, the right to life and therefore all other rights. The latter will be classified as civilised for protecting not only that right, but all the others.

Thank God our country came to its senses in 1995 by abolishing this scourge once and for all, thereby rejoining the civilised world where we belong.

It’s up to every one of us to realise Nelson Mandela’s dream of a beautiful SA for all its people, black and white, not the one the DA and these little scraps of parties are busy with: ethnic, privileged, dangerous enclaves and laagers in which they hope to feel safe.

Koert Meyer
Welgelegen

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