Justice system should priotise rehabilitation, not punishment

Over the past week, it has come to the attention of the Kenyan public that a Kenyan national, is facing the death penalty in Vietnam. Margaret Nduta Macharia was arrested in July, 2023 for smuggling more than two kilogrammes of cocaine within her luggage while on her way from Kenya to Laos.

During the trial, Nduta said she was sent by a Mr John to ferry the package and paid about Sh150,000. John also paid her plane ticket. Unfortunately, while she was able to bypass the scrutiny of the Kenyan, Ethiopian and Qatari airports, her secret was discovered in Vietnam, a country with the strictest drug laws.

Nduta’s case is the first in recent history to bring to the fore of the Kenyan consciousness the question of how crime is dealt with, and whether the punishment befits the crime. In this case, a compassionate examination of the case would lead to the conclusion that Nduta was perhaps in a bad place financially if she so readily agreed to perform a life threatening task as this.

Drug trafficking often relies on the innocence of those who are asked to carry the drugs across state lines. However, where the drug mule has been hired solely for the job, the desperation and financial precarity of the trafficker is leveraged against them.

Vietnam imposes extremely strict laws against drug trafficking. This does not change the fact that the victims are the ones who end up being caught in the web of the justice system while those who run the system and benefit from it get away with literal murder. Perhaps the extreme sentence is meant to act as a deterrent; but there are still people desperate enough to try their luck, and it is these people that end up suffering for their desperation.

Terrible example

Across the world, the criminal justice system ought to exist for the purposes of rehabilitation and retribution, rather than a site of mere punishment and even death. Unfortunately, in many jurisdictions, a lot of people are dealt an unfair hand and the system pursues justice over mercy.

The case of Khalil Divine Black Sun Allah, who was killed by lethal injection in September 2024 in South Carolina, USA, despite evidence of his innocence, is one terrible example of the excesses of the system.

Even in Kenya, the reaction of the public where rehabilitation is the approach taken as opposed to punishment and locking away is met with great disapproval. A case that underscores this is that of Ruth Kamande who was found guilty of murdering her partner and sentenced to life in prison at Lang’ata Women’s Prison.

Since her imprisonment, Kamande has been the subject of numerous rehabilitation projects by organisations such as Justice Defenders, and has since earned herself a law degree, which she uses to assist her fellow inmates to handle their court cases. Despite this, Kenyans’ reaction to any news of Kamande’s progress in prison is overwhelmingly negative. On social media, comment sections of news outlets sharing her story are filled with one resounding sentiment: Kamande committed murder, and therefore ought to be left to rot in jail.

As a society, we cannot be so harsh to our inmates as to demand that they should not be rehabilitated, while at the same time pleading leniency for our citizens when they face harsh laws abroad for crimes they are found guilty of.

Instead, we ought to examine what to expect of the justice system and whether it is serving the purpose of rehabilitation. Otherwise we should admit that we appreciate that the prisons exist to lock away the undesirables of society so that we never have to see or think about them again.

Ms Gitahi is an international lawyer