Aotearoa human rights advocates appeal for clemency for scheduled execution in Singapore

The Singapore Prison System has served its first execution notice of 2023.

The family of Tangaraju s/o Suppiah, a 46-year-old Tamil Singaporean man, received news on April 19, that he would be executed the following week on April 26.

If carried out, he will be the first person the state executes under its infamous mandatory death penalty law, since October 2022.

Last year, Singapore executed 11 people in seven months, all for non-violent drug offences.

Tangaraju was convicted of abetting to traffic one kilogram of cannabis — a substance that is being decriminalised or legalised in a growing number of jurisdictions, including in Southeast Asia.

He was questioned by the police without a lawyer present, denied a Tamil-speaking interpreter while his statement was being recorded and had trouble understanding the English statement read back to him.

A majority of the prisoners who receive the death sentence in Singapore are Indigenous Malays or from minoritised South Asian ethnic groups (classified by the state as ‘Indian’).

There is an urgent need for global outcry against the use of the death penalty.

As abolitionists in Aotearoa, we appeal to the President of Singapore, Halimah Yacob to grant immediate clemency to Tangaraju, demand the Singapore state to end its use of capital and corporal punishment, and stand in solidarity with those fighting for abolition.

As one of Singapore’s key allies, Aotearoa New Zealand needs to confront the brutal carceral measures that the Singapore state routinely undertakes.

As Singapore enjoys its positive global reputation, its most marginalised members of society are silenced and receive the full force of state brutality.

"Everywhere British colonial laws like capital punishment operate, the lives of Indigenous and marginalised communities are destroyed,” said Nabilah Husna Abdul Rahman, a Singaporean living in Te Whanganui a Tara, who is part of Asians Supporting Tino Rangatiratanga.

“Here in Aotearoa, our decolonial struggle against the violence of the carceral system continues even after the legal abolition of the death penalty. We stand in solidarity with those in Singapore fighting against state violence."

Recently, former Prime Minister Helen Clark and the chair of the Global Commission on Drug Policy called for drug use to be decriminalised and for drug users to no longer be incarcerated.

Clark spoke at a panel as part of the Harm Reduction International which took place in Melbourne last week.

Since 1990, Singapore has executed 500 people, with the majority convicted of drug offences.

For media queries, please contact Nabilah at antiauthoritariansolidarity@gmail.com or 0291216395.

To speak to human rights advocates in Singapore working directly with Tangaraju Suppiah and his family, please write to Transformative Justice Collective in Singapore at transformjustice.media@gmail.com.

Supported by:

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Asians Supporting Tino Rangatiratanga

Peace Action Wellington

Pōneke Anti-Fascist Coalition

Te Kuaka