Africa-Press – Cape verde. This Monday, Cardinal Dom Arlindo Furtado praised and thanked the gesture of the President of the Republic, José Maria Neves, of granting pardon to prisoners in Cape Verde’s prisons, responding to Pope Francis’ appeal.
Dom Arlindo Furtado, who is also bishop of the Diocese of Santiago de Cape Verde, spoke during the Christmas mass in Praia’s pro-cathedral, remembering that Pope Francis has been insisting, for some years now, with the presidents of the Republics throughout world, to grant pardons to prisoners who meet the criteria for doing so.
“I received a communication from the President of the Republic who, in accordance with the criteria set out in the law, granted a pardon in accordance with the Pope’s request. And with the collaboration of the Government, which certainly helps in processing the data, it granted pardons to 100 prisoners, 100 of our prisoners”, he said before the final blessing of the mass on the morning of Christmas Day.
“It is a grace that we register, thank and congratulate the structures of power. Let us hope that, with our help, these pardoned prisoners will know how to deserve grace and behave as they should, in full family and social integration. This is what we also want”, added the cardinal and bishop.
On Friday, the 22nd, the Presidency of the Republic announced that the President of the Republic, José Maria Neves, granted pardon to inmates in the country’s jails who meet the “clearly indicated” requirements to return to freedom, within a framework of “personal dignity, accountability individual and effective social reintegration”.
According to the presidential note sent to Inforpress, the head of state’s decision is “imbued with the spirit” of the festive season of Christmas and New Year and which, after listening to the Government, proclaims the values of “humanism, tolerance and compassion ”, as well as the “deep, well-rooted feeling”, in fact, in Cape Verdean society of “family celebration, typical of this period of fraternization”.
This decision of grace, according to the same source, is also in line with Pope Francis’ appeal, in the sense of a gesture of clemency in favor of brothers and sisters deprived of freedom, saluting, at the same time, the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
In light of the Constitution, the nation’s highest magistrate thus grants pardon to inmates sentenced to a custodial sentence of no more than eight years who, by December 31, 2023, have served 2/3 of their sentence, and inmates sentenced to custodial sentence of more than eight years who, by December 31, 2023, have reached 60 years of age and served half of their sentence.
Inmates suffering from a serious and incurable illness or a highly disabling physical or mental condition, duly proven by a medical entity, and who require continuous care that cannot be provided in the prison establishment, also benefit from this pardon.
All beneficiaries, reads the presidential note, must be accompanied by the Social Reinsertion Services until the date on which they complete the fulfillment of their respective sentences originally decreed.
Prisoners convicted of crimes of torture, terrorism, murder, crimes against the State, drug trafficking, GBV crimes or those committed against the elderly and children, money laundering and other forms of organized crime are excluded from acquittals.
Those who are complying with security measures and preventive prisoners, repeat offenders and in the case of other pending cases in which preventive detention is determined also do not benefit from the measure.
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