Amos Mbedzi was spared the death penalty
by Swaziland High Court Judge Bheki Maphalala because he had not intended to
kill his two companions with a bomb.
Mbedzi, aged 48, was instead sentenced
to a total of 85 years in jail on two counts of murder, unlawful possession of
explosives, sedition, and illegal entry into Swaziland. The sentences will run
concurrently and he will serve 25 years of this time, backdated to the time of
his arrest on 20 September 2008.
Maphalala in his judgement said
the Swazi constitution allowed for the death penalty in cases of murder but the
court had discretion on whether to impose it.
He said, ‘Taking into account all the
circumstances of this case, I am persuaded that this is not a proper case in
which I should impose a death penalty.
In particular the evidence proves that the direct intention of the
accused was not to kill the deceased but to bomb the bridge.’
In sentencing he refused to accept Mbedzi’s
mitigation that he is married with three minor children to support and that his
children stand to suffer for any punishment imposed by the court.
Instead, he accepted the prosecution’s
case that the crimes were very serious. He said, ‘Their seriousness outweighs
the personal circumstances of the accused’.
Mbedzi was described by the AFP news agency as a part of the Umbane People's
Liberation Army, ‘a secret militant group linked to the People's United
Democratic Movement (PUDEMO), which sought to undermine elections that year [2008]
until Swaziland allowed a multi-party vote’.
He had been convicted of attempting to
bomb a bridge near the Lozitha royal residence in September 2008. King Mswati
III had been expected to use the bridge later in the day. Maphalala said Mbedzi,
a South African, ‘was engaged in violent revolution to overthrow the State’.
The sentence has caused outrage among
pro-democracy groups, who see Mbedzi as a victim of King Mswati, who rules
Swaziland as sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch.
The People’s United Democratic Movement
(PUDEMO) called Mbedzi’s sentence, ‘an open expression and declaration by
the royal regime of its unwillingness to accommodate diverging views on the
country’s political direction and future’.
The Communist Party of Swaziland called
the attempt to blow up the bridge, ‘a brave and principled act of struggle
against the illegal Mswati regime’
The Swaziland Solidarity Network said of
the sentence, ‘This is a clear declaration of war to the forces of democracy in
Swaziland. When people are left with no option to protect their human rights,
they are bound to explore all possible means to realise them.’
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