* 76. The Respondent State, also without any elaboration, submitted that it “did not violate the provisions of Article 4 …” of the Charter. *** 77. Regardless of the above, and notwithstanding the paucity of the Parties’ submissions on this point, the Court considers it logical, given its jurisprudence, and the fact that the Applicant was mandatorily sentenced to death, to restate the human rights implications of the course of action taken by the Respondent State. 78. Article 4 of the Charter, the Court recalls, provides as follows: “[h]uman beings are inviolable. Every human being shall be entitled to respect for his life and the integrity of his person. No one may be arbitrarily deprived of this right.” 79. The Court takes cognisance of the fact that the Applicant was sentenced to suffer death under a regime that provides no discretion to the judicial officer seised of such cases. As the Court has held, by taking away the discretionary power of a judicial officer to impose a sentence on the basis of proportionality and the individual circumstances of a convicted person, the mandatory death sentence regime, which applies in the Respondent State, falls afoul of the requirements of due process in criminal proceedings.18 80. Further, and as also recognised by the Court, the mandatory imposition of the death sentence, as applied under the Respondent State’s law, is also arbitrary within the meaning of Article 4 of the Charter as it deprives the judicial officer of the discretion to consider specific circumstances of particular cases, including whether such cases fall within the classification 18 Rajabu and Others v. Tanzania (merits and reparations), supra, § 163; Gozbert Henerico v. United Republic of Tanzania, ACtHPR, Application No. 004/2015, Judgment of 10 January 2022, § 207. 18

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