Thursday, April 30, 2015

Good For Indonesia

After all the appeals, legal wranglings, and media attention, it is finally done. Indonesia has executed seven foreigners who had been part of a drug trafficking gang. Indonesia had been under tremendous pressure not to execute the men but they had chose to ignore the foreign pressure and did what their laws demanded. 

Good for them! As I had written before, I am fully in support of the death penalty and I believe capital punishment is especially needed for drug traffickers. Drugs can and does cause huge sufferings to the family of drug addicts and there was no doubt in anyone's mind about the guilt of the people executed. The only convicted person who was not executed was Filipino Mary Jane Veloso. She was spared because there were reasons to believe she was tricked into carrying drugs to Indonesia. Helping her case was the fact that she turned herself in to authorities in the Philippines.

For the rest? Sorry for their deaths, but I'm even more sorry for their victims. The countless drug addicts who had their lives and their families' lives destroyed by the drugs this gang was trafficking in. I don't blame Indonesian President Joko Widodo for being strong and doing what's necessary to protect his citizens. It's about time and it's something good for Indonesia.

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