¹ The Commonwealth countries of Southern Africa have a rather different history and legal tradition from Commonwealth countries elsewhere on the continent and this article will, therefore, concentrate largely on Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Malawi.

² See Sumner, C. in Sumner (ed.), Criminal Justice and Underdevelopment, Heinemann, 1982, 1ff., for a critique of how orthodox criminological theory has ignored crimes of the state in Africa.Google Scholar

³ Morris, H.F., “A history of the adoption of criminal law and procedure in British Colonial Africa, 1876–1935”, [1974] J.A.L. 6. In some territories the codes were known as Penal Codes, in others as Criminal Codes. General references in the text to Penal Codes can be taken to apply to Criminal Codes.Google Scholar

⁴ In 1964 Botswana introduced a Penal Code based on the Queensland model, replacing the Roman-Dutch common law. The Penal Code introduced into Northern Nigeria in 1959 derives from the Sudan Penal Code and ultimately from the Indian Penal Code; it makes certain concessions to Islamic Law.

⁵ Some provisions in the Codes refer directly to English law and, in particular, many Codes provided that they should be interpreted according to English principles of legal interpretation. See Read, J.S., “Criminal law in the Africa of today and tomorrow”, [1963] J.A.L. 5, at 7.Google Scholar

⁶ See the discussion of crime and the native courts of Nyasaland and Northern Rhodesia in Chanock, M., Law, Custom and Social Order, Cambridge, 1985, at 103ff. and 229ff. In the 1950s only 15 per cent of criminal cases in Nyasaland involved crime in the ordinary sense of the word, the remainder involved infringements of the tax laws and other disciplinary or regulatory offences.Google Scholar

⁷ An investigation in Kenya found only a handful of customary criminal offences that were not also offences under the Penal Code. See Cotran, E., Report on Customary Criminal Offences in Kenya, Government Printer, Nairobi, 1963.Google Scholar

⁸ For Nigeria, see generally A. Milner, “The sanctions of customary criminal law: a study in social control”, [1965] Nigerian Law Journal 173. Milner argues that it is the attitudes and the ideas of customary criminal law, rather than specific rules or sanctions, that may be relevant to a modern penal system, ibid., 176.

⁹ Trial by jury was confined to West African colonies and to Kenya (where it was further confined to Europeans). See generally Jearey, J.H., “Trial by jury and trial with the aid of assessors in the superior courts of British African territories”, [1960] J.A.L. 133Google Scholar and [1961] J.A.L. 36.Google Scholar

¹⁰ It was only in certain highly centralized states (for example in Buganda and in parts of Nigeria) that imprisonment was an established sanction in pre-colonial Africa.

¹¹ In many instances an African prisoner, convicted, say, of stock-theft or of a breach of the conservation laws, would not see himself as a “criminal”. See Tanner, R.E.S., “The East African experience of punishment”, in Milner, A. (ed.), African Penal Systems, London, 1969, 315.Google Scholar

¹² Tanner, R.E.S., “Penal practices in Africa: some restrictions on the possibility of reform”, (1972) 10(3) Journal of Modern African Studies 447, at 451.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹³ The figure tended to vary between 40 per cent and 60 per cent: see figures in Milner, (ed.), op. cit., at 78 and 129–130.Google Scholar

¹⁴ The establishment of special custodial institutions for juveniles was very slow. In most countries the provision of remand homes, approved schools and borstals was minimal at independence. For Nigeria, for example, see Milner in Milner, A. (ed.), op. cit., 355–373, and for Ghana see Seidman in Milner, R. (ed.), op. cit., 455. Clifford forcefully makes the point that in countries where many law-abiding children are denied formal education, it may seem unjust to place juvenile offenders in a more favourable position for employment. Clifford, W., An Introduction to African Criminology, Oxford, 1974, 197.Google Scholar

¹⁵ A lack of psychiatrists and of special institutions for the mentally ill meant that mentally ill offenders ordered to be detained during pleasure were in fact committed to prison. Indeed, evidence from Nigeria indicated that well over half of the mentally ill accommodated within the prison system were civil committals for whom places could not be found in hospital. Milner, A., The Nigerian Penal System, London, 1972, 263–4.Google Scholar

¹⁶ An exception was the Gold Coast where trade education formed an essential component of Prisons Department policy from the 1920s onward; see Seidman, in Milner, (ed.), op. cit., 429, at 451. In most territories the prison system was seriously under-resourced.Google Scholar

¹⁷ In pre-colonial Africa it was only in centralized societies that the fine, in the sense of the forfeiture of property to the state, was to be found. It was much more common for a wrong-doer to be ordered to make restitution or pay compensation to the victim or the victim's family.

¹⁸ In Ghana, for example, 45 per cent of those committed to prison in 1961 were fine-defaulters. Milner, (ed.), op. cit., at 76.Google Scholar

¹⁹ Treason and piracy were also capital offences. During the Kenyan State of Emergency (1952–1960) there was a marked increase in the number of capital crimes and death sentences.

²⁰ It remained, however, an extremely popular punishment for juveniles. In the period 1958–1963, 79 per cent of juvenile offenders in the region were sentenced to corporal punishment. Milner, , op. cit. (1972), 99.Google Scholar

²¹ See Brown, D., “The award of compensation in criminal cases in East Africa”, [1966] J.A.L. 33 at 35.Google Scholar Also see Read in Milner, J.S. (ed.), op. cit., at 155,Google Scholar and Kercher, L.C., The Kenya Penal System, University Press of America, 1981, 71.Google Scholar For the discussion of an instance where the East African Court of Appeal was prepared to award “blood money” in a manslaughter case, see Morris, H.F., “The award of blood money in East African manslaughter cases”, [1974] J.A.L. 104.Google Scholar

²² Kercher, , op. cit., 7.Google Scholar

²³ The basic attitudes of the English-type courts in Nigeria were “repressive and oriented towards deterrence”; Milner in Milner (ed.), op. cit., 268. In the Gold Coast the British saw in “harsh, exemplary deterrence the central objective of the law”; Seidman, ibid., 433.

²⁴ The Collective Punishment Laws were often used to deal with stock-theft. However, where traditional cattle raids were transformed during the colonial period into multi-ethnic gangs organized to drive cattle long distances and across borders, the laws ceased to be effective. See Anderson, D., “Stock theft and moral economy in colonial Kenya”, (1986) 56(4) Africa399.Google Scholar

²⁵ For an interesting account of how difficulties in bringing politically-motivated arsonists of public buildings to justice in colonial Uganda led to the offence of arson being (temporarily) brought within the scope of the Collective Punishment Ordinance, see Hopkins, E., “The politics of crime: aggression and control in a colonial context”, (1973) 75 American Anthropologist 731.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

²⁶ The Attorney-General of Tanzania once asked (rhetorically), “Is it enough to rely on a Penal Code written in a background of preoccupation of protection for the individual and his property? What about the protection of society as a whole and its property?”; Bomani, M., “The machinery of justice in a developing society”, (May 1966) East Africa Journal 20, at 23. Except for amendments relating to self-defence, the Tanzanian Code remains largely unchanged today.Google Scholar

²⁷ Read, J.S., “Penal systems in common law Africa”, (1968) 39 Revue intemationate de droit penal 181, at 185.Google Scholar

²⁸ Where the Codes have been amended, this has usually been done in order to increase penalties. Examples are discussed below.

²⁹ Independence Constitutions contained a provision to the effect that no person should be convicted of a criminal offence unless that offence is denned and the penalty therefor is prescribed in a written law.

³⁰ See Hatchard, J., “Developing the criminal law in Zambia: The Penal Code (Amendment) Act, 1990”, [1992] J.A.L. 103.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

³¹ See Commonwealth Law Bulletin, 1981, 613ff, for a summary of its recommendations, most of which were incorporated in the Criminal Procedure Act, 1985.Google Scholar

³² The Penal Code (Amendment) Act, 1980, contained the new law on self-defence and also gave effect to several other of the Commission's recommendations. Elsewhere Penal Code references to the principles of English law remain untouched.

³³ Recommendation (lviii), (1981) Commonwealth Law Bulletin 618.

³⁴ These policies are discussed below.

³⁵ The 1984 ECOSOC safeguards state that the scope of crimes punishable by death “should not go beyond intentional crimes”. However, although there are variations in the Penal Code provisions, “malice aforethought” may include constructive malice (abolished in Britain in 1957) and/or recklessness (a ground of liability for manslaughter in Britain). The 1970 Penal Code Amendment Act of Uganda abolished implied and constructive malice, redefining “malice aforethought” as intention to cause death, or knowledge that the act or omission causing death will probably cause death.

³⁶ Owoade, M.A., “Death penalty—the Nigerian experience”, (1985) 11(1&2) Indian Socio-Legal Journal 16 at 19.Google Scholar

³⁷ [1986] 1 N.W.L.R. 75.Google Scholar See Isedonmwen, E.O., “A requiem for provocation”, [1988] J.A.L. 194 for a cogent criticism of this case.Google Scholar

³⁸ (1987–88) Ghana Law Digest 46. The courts have also interpreted section 53 of the Criminal Code in a restrictive way, holding that as a matter of law the theft of the accused's cattle could not amount to provocation; (1989–90) Ghana Law Digest 98.

³⁹ This will depend largely on whether he is fortunate enough to get access to expert testimony, and even then a judge may reject that testimony. See Bienen, L., “The determination of criminal insanity in Western Nigeria”, (1976) 14(2) Journal of Modern African Studies 219.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁴⁰ Owoade, M.A., op. cit., at 20.Google Scholar

⁴¹ Writers on Ghana some 30 years ago concluded, “In general questions of mens rea and specific problems of intent, mistake, mental abnormality, provocation and absolute liability, [the Ghanaian courts] have given the Code a common law interpretation which has forced it in the direction of objective mens rea and general deterrence”. Seidman, R.B. and Abaka Edison, J.D., in Milner, (ed.), op. cit., at 75. Such evidence as there is suggests that the comment would be valid today.Google Scholar

⁴² The Human Resources Deployment Act, 1983, provided machinery for the compulsory repatriation of the urban unemployed to their villages. These measures were largely ineffective, though they provided an opportunity for police harassment of the poor. See, generally, Shaidi, L.P., “Crime, justice and politics in continental Tanzania”, (1989) 17 International Journal of the Sociology Law 247.Google Scholar

⁴³ National Drug Law Enforcement Decree (No. 48 of 1989) and the Prevention of Money-Laundering Decree (No. 3 of 1995). Outside Southern Africa, Nigeria is the only Commonwealth African country to have laws dealing specifically with money-laundering. This is discussed further below.

⁴⁴ These courts, which generated international criticism, were abolished by the 1994 Constitution, art. 110 (3).Google Scholar For a discussion of the operation of these courts in homicide cases, see Brietzke, P., “Murder and manslaughter in Malawi's Traditional Courts”, [1974] J.A.L. 37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁴⁵ See Chanock, M., “Neo-traditionalism and the customary law of Malawi”, 16 African Law Studies, 80. Of course, there was little that was either traditional or African about the new courts. The reinforcement of the position of the chiefs had an obvious political dimension.Google Scholar

⁴⁶ Statutory provisions prohibiting the grant of bail may be open to constitutional challenge. In Tanzania a number of successful challenges have been made to section 148 (5) of the Criminal Procedure Act, 1985, which lists circumstances in which bail must be denied. See, for example, Daudi Pete, [1991] L.R.C. (Const) 553.Google Scholar

⁴⁷ The worst situation is probably to be found in Nigeria. Prison admissions rose from 87,947 in 1975 to 269,121 in 1988. More than two-thirds of inmates are on remand. Long trial adjournments coupled with the failure of the accused to meet bail conditions is largely responsible. See Alemike, E. and Alemike, E., “Penal crisis and prison management in Nigeria”, (1994) 1(2) Journal of Nigerian and Comparative Law 62 at 77.Google ScholarIn 1994 more than one-third of the Kenyan prison population was on remand. Kenya Human Rights Commission, A Death Sentence; Prison Conditions in Kenya, Nairobi, 27.Google Scholar

⁴⁸ The High Court of Tanzania has held that the constitutional right to a fair hearing implies a right to legal representation at the expense of the State where the accused cannot afford the expense him/herself. Khasim Hamisi Manywele, High Court of Tanzania at Dodoma, Criminal Appeal No. 39 of 1990, reproduced in Maina Peter, C., Human Rights in Tanzania: Selected Cases and Materials, Cologne, 1997, 349.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ Confessions to the police do not require corroboration to be admitted as evidence in court. For an account of some of the problems to which this gives rise, see Nsereko, D.D.N., “The poisoned tree: responses to involuntary confessions in criminal proceedings in Botswana, Uganda and Zambia”, (1998) 5 American Journal of International and Comparative Law 609.Google Scholar

⁵⁰ In Zambia, for example, the provisions of the Juveniles Act are largely ignored. See Simaluwani, E.M., “The criminal process in juvenile courts in Zambia”, (1997) 29 Zambia Law Journal 71.Google Scholar

⁵¹ Notably for offences involving corruption. For a discussion of the variety of measures taken to combat corruption, see Coldham, S., “Legal responses to state corruption in Commonwealth Africa”, [1995] J.A.L. 1.Google Scholar

⁵² The Act replaced the Economic Sabotage (Special Provisions) Act, 1983, some of whose provisions (for example no appeal, no bail, no advocates, decision by a majority) had provoked domestic and international criticism, though it had been justified by President Nyerere on the grounds that the courts had proved incapable of dealing with racketeers. See Peter, Maina, op. cit., 493ff.Google Scholar

⁵³ Attorney-General, Bhagvatilal Dabyabhai Rao v., SCZ Appeal No. 24 of 1987.Google Scholar For differing views of the decision see Mbao, M.L., [1989] J.A.L. 116Google Scholar and Simamba, B.H., (1988) 4(2) Lesotho Law Journal 171.Google Scholar

⁵⁴ See generally Owoade, M.A., “The Military and the Criminal Law in Nigeria”, [1989] J.A.L. 136,Google Scholar and for developments during the 1990s see Okonkwo, C. O. in Ayua, I. A. (ed.), Law, Justice and the Nigerian Society, Lagos, 1995.Google Scholar The Saro-Wiwa trial attracted international publicity: see comment in Vukor-Quarshie, G. N. K., [1997] J.A.L. 215.Google Scholar

⁵⁵ Tribunals (Certain Consequential Amendments etc.) Decree No. 62 of 1999 and Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (Certain Consequential Repeals) Decree No. 63 of 1999.

⁵⁶ See generally Frimpong, K., “Criminal law and criminal justice in Ghana since the military coup of December 31, 1981”, (1983) 4 Jahrbuch fur Afrikanisches Recht 27.Google Scholar

⁵⁷ Public Tribunals Law, 1983, s. 8 (1).Google Scholar

⁵⁸ Courts Act No. 459 of 1993, s. 120 (1).Google Scholar

⁵⁹ Hatchard, J., “Crime and penal policy in Zambia”, (1985) Journal of Modern African Studies 493 at 500.Google Scholar

⁶⁰ It has been described as a “frequent occurrence” and “a part of urban life” in Zambia; Hatchard, J. and Ndulo, M., Readings in Criminal Law and Criminology in Zambia, James Currey, 1994, 95.Google Scholar

⁶¹ Much has been written on the Sungusungu. See, for example, Bukurura, S.H., “The maintenance of order in rural Tanzania: the case of the Sungusungu”, (1994) 34(1) Journal of Legal Pluralism and Unofficial Law and Maina Peter, op. cit., 512ff.Google Scholar

⁶² Sungusungu groups often try and punish suspects, and execution and torture are not unknown. See [1991] Tanzania Law Reports 1 and [1992] Tanzania Law Reports 134.

⁶³ For a detailed treatment of this topic see Hatchard, J. and Coldham, S., ”Commonwealth Africa”, in Hodgkinson, P. and Rutherford, A. (eds.), Capital Punishment: Global Issues and Prospects, Waterside, 1996.Google Scholar

⁶⁴ The Zambian Penal Code was amended in 1990 to provide that the death penalty need not be imposed for murder where there are extenuating circumstances.

⁶⁵ Penal Code Amendment Ordinance, 1972. See Capstick, W. P., “Aspects of the penal consequences of economic change”, (1973) 3 Revue Camerounaise de Droit 8.Google Scholar

⁶⁶ Similarly a person charged with a capital offence before the Regional Traditional Courts of Malawi was deprived of many of the safeguards of a High Court trial.

⁶⁷ This became s. 15(4) of the Constitution of Zimbabwe.

⁶⁸ Mbushuu v. Republic [1995] 1 L.R.C. 216.Google Scholar To similar effect, in State v. Ntesang [1995] 2 L.R.C. 338,Google Scholar the Court of Appeal of Botswana ruled that capital punishment was constitutional because s. 7(1) (prohibiting torture, inhuman or degrading punishment) was qualified by s. 7(2) (expressly preserving the death sentence).

⁶⁹ S v. Makwanyane and Mchunu, 1995 (3) SA 391. For a more detailed examination of these cases as well as a discussion of the effect of delay in carrying out the sentence, see Hatchard and Coldham, op. cit., at 170ff.Google Scholar

⁷⁰ Communication No. 390/1990, noted in [1997] J.A.L. 147.Google Scholar

⁷¹ It was abolished in Ghana in 1960.

⁷² For example, the Indian Hemp Decree, 1966, and the Robbery and Firearms (Special Provisions) Decree, 1970.

⁷³ See, generally, L.C. Kercher, op. cit., 73ff. He notes that the use of corporal punishment for adults rose from an annual figure of 181 in 1962 to around 5,000 cases in the late 1970s.

⁷⁴ C. J., Silungwe, in Berejena v. The People, [1984] Z.R. 19, at 21.Google Scholar

⁷⁵ [1992] Tanzania Law Reports 157, also reproduced in Maina Peter, op. cit., 115. Mandatory corporal punishment had been abolished by the Minimum Sentences Act, 1972, only to be reintroduced in 1989 by an enthusiastic and near unanimous Parliament.

⁷⁶ 1987 (2) ZLR 246.

⁷⁷ 1989 (2) ZLR 61. Rule 17(3) of the UN Standard Minimum Rules for the Administration of Juvenile Justice, 1985, calls for the abolition of corporal punishment for juveniles.

⁷⁸ Constitution of Zimbabwe Amendment Act No. 11 of 1990.

⁷⁹ Ex parte Attorney-General Namibia in re Corporal Punishment, 1991 (3) S.A. 76.Google Scholar See Hatchard, J., “The fall of the cane again: Corporal punishment in Namibia”, [1992] J.A.L. 81.Google Scholar

⁸⁰ Writing in the 1970s, Clifford commented that “the prison in Africa remains central and crucial to the concept of the treatment of criminals and the frequent recourse to prison sentencing for first offenders … attests to its popularity with the courts”. Clifford, op. cit., 190. The comment remains valid today.

⁸¹ In Zambia, in 1966 sentences of less than three months accounted for 56 per cent of prison sentences and sentences of over eighteen months for 7 per cent, whereas in 1986 the figures were 15 per cent and 22 per cent. See Hatchard and Ndulo, op. cit., 90ff. The interpretation of such statistics is problematic.

⁸² Alemika and Alemika, op.cit., at 74ff. For example, persons are imprisoned for idleness, for violation of local and customary laws, for non-payment of debts or fines, or because they are mentally ill and there is nowhere else to send them. Juveniles are routinely sent to prison and little attempt is made to separate them from adult convicts. On juvenile justice in Nigeria, see M.T. Ladan in Ayua (ed), op. cit.

⁸³ Kenya Human Rights Commission, op. cit., 30.

⁸⁴ The large number of prisoners on remand has been noted above. Most systems allow for remission for good behaviour, but there is little information on how this operates in practice. The Zimbabwe Criminal Procedure and Evidence Amendment Act, 1997, provides that life imprisonment means life, though it is arguable that a provision entirely precluding the possibility of early release is unconstitutional; see State v. Tcoaib [1997] 1 L.R.C. 90, where the Supreme Court of Namibia considered that it would be.Google Scholar

⁸⁵ The Botswana Penal Code (Amendment) Act, 1998, introduced a minimum ten-year prison sentence for rape.

⁸⁶ For Kenya, see Kercher, op. cit., 248ff., and for Zambia, see Hatchard and Ndulo, op. cit., 82ff. The Ghanaian Punishment of Habitual Criminals Act, 1963, introduced a minimum sentence of ten years imprisonment with hard labour for a person convicted for the third time of any felony or misdemeanour. For a comment on this extreme example of the “three strikes and you're out” principle, see Kuenyehia, A., “The problem of recidivism in the Ghanaian penal system”, (1978–81) 15 University of Ghana Law Journal, 84.Google Scholar

⁸⁷ Cheating in examinations, for example, or ridiculing government officers. See, generally, Owoade (1989), op. cit.

⁸⁸ The 1972 Act abolished mandatory corporal punishment, as noted above.

⁸⁹ J., Mwalusanya, distinguished the decision of the Supreme Court of Zimbabwe in The State v. Arab [1990] 1 Z.L.R. 253 precisely because under the applicable Zimbabwean legislation the trial court was entitled to take special factors into account in determining whether or not to apply the minimum sentence provision.Google Scholar

⁹⁰ State v. Vries [1997] 4 L.R.C. 1.Google Scholar

⁹¹ Owoade (1989), op. cit, 136. The penalties were drastically reduced in 1975.

⁹² Clement Ng'ong'ola, “Controlling theft in the public service: penal law and judicial responses in Malawi”, [1988] J.A.L. 72, at 94.Google Scholar

⁹³ Bringer, P., “The abiding influence of English and French Criminal Law in one African country: some remarks regarding the machinery of criminal justice in Cameroon”, [1981] J.A.L. 1, at 12. Bringer identifies a growing tendency for theft cases to be decided “customarily” by awards of compensation, none of the parties having an interest in involving the official courts.Google Scholar

⁹⁴ Williams, D., “The Minimum Sentences Act, 1972, of Tanzania”, [1974] J.A.L. 79 at 86.Google Scholar

⁹⁵ Mwansa, K. T., “Aggravated robbery and the death penalty in Zambia: an examination of the 1974 Penal Code Amendment) Act (No. 2)”, (1984) 16 Zambia Law Journal 69. Of those sentenced to death in Zambia, only a small proportion have actually been executed. Many remain on “death row”.Google Scholar

⁹⁶ Karibi-Whyte, A. G., Criminal Policy: Traditional and Modem Trends, Lagos, 1988, 111.Google Scholar To similar effect is Milner op. cit. (1972), 272ff. One writer concludes that while there is no evidence that the death penalty has a deterrent effect, there is evidence that it leads robbers to use greater brutality than they would otherwise have done. Dambazau, A. B., Law and Criminality in Nigeria, University Press, Ibadan, 1994, 141.Google Scholar

⁹⁷ Williams, op. cit., 88.

⁹⁸ Ibid., 80.

⁹⁹ Nsereko, D. D., “Crime prevention in Southern Africa: a legal perspective”, (1999) 32(2) Comparative and International Law Journal of Southern Africa 247, at 257.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁰ This is the case, despite the fact that many Commonwealth African states are parties to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights which lays down the reformation and social rehabilitation of prisoners as an essential objective of imprisonment.

¹⁰¹ Even when a person does acquire skills in prison, the absence of an “after-care” service, the absence of any system to place discharged prisoners in employment and the absence of a parole system or similar scheme of supervised freedom mean that the prospects of social readjustment are poor.

¹⁰² For a horrifying picture of the state of prisons in Nigeria, see Civil Liberties Organisation, Behind the Wall: A Report on Prison Conditions in Nigeria and the Nigerian Prison System, Lagos, 1996. For Kenya, see Kenya Human Rights Commission, op. cit.Google Scholar

¹⁰³ In Zambia probation is restricted to juveniles, there is little contact between probationer and probation officer, and many probationers fail to complete their probation period. See generally, Hatchard, J., “Policy and perspectives on juvenile justice”, in Osei-Hwedi and Muna Ndulo (eds.), Youth and Development, Lusaka, 1990. For a discussion of ways in which the probation system could be adapted to African conditions see Clifford, op. cit., 198ff.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁴ An EU-funded pilot scheme was started in 1994. Community-based programmes are, of course, much less expensive than imprisonment. It has been estimated that the monthly cost of keeping an individual in prison in Zimbabwe in 1995 was US$65, whereas the monthly cost of community service per individual was US$10–20. “Prisons in Africa”, West Africa, 10–16 February, 1997, 220.

¹⁰⁵ For example, see Junod, H. P., “African penal conceptions and the emancipation of African states”, Geneve-Afrique, 1962, 1, 156;Google ScholarBoehringer, G. H., “Aspects of penal policy in Africa, with special reference to Tanzania”, [1971] J.A.L. 182;Google ScholarOwoade, M. A., “Legal aspects of compensation and restitution in the science of victimology in Nigeria”, (1996) 21(1&2) Indian Socio-Legal Journal 7.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁶ It has already been mentioned that the Tanzanian Minimum Sentences legislation provided for compulsory compensation in the case of various property offences. This was, however, in addition to a sentence of imprisonment and (for a period) to mandatory corporal punishment. It was not an alternative, and, given that the offender would be in prison for several years, it is not clear how he would find the money to pay. See Williams, D., “Compensation for victims of crime in Tanzania”, (1973) 44 Revue Internationale de Droit Penal 266.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁷ Thus in Zambia the crime rate rose, with some fluctuations, from 1,287 offences per 100,000 of population in 1964 to 2,168 in 1980. Hatchard and Ndulo, op. cit, 75.

¹⁰⁸ Urban life is subject to a multiplicity of regulations and it is breaches of these that bring many people before the criminal courts.

¹⁰⁹ See Dambazau, op. cit., 150ff.

¹¹⁰ See Tanner, R. E. S., “Penal practices in Africa: Some restrictions on the possibility of reform”, (1972) 10(3) Journal of Modern African Studies 447.CrossRefGoogle Scholar For a vivid account of how a ruthless armed robber became something of a folk-hero in Nigeria for his challenge to the power of the state and its corrupt representatives, see Marenin, O., “The Anini saga: armed robbery and the reproduction of ideology in Nigeria”, (1987) 25(2) Journal of Modem African Studies 259.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹¹¹ Clifford, op. cit., 210. One researcher who analysed data for 11 sub-Saharan African countries for the period 1961–1984 concluded that the impact of development on crime was positive only for minor property offences. Rates for homicide and major property offences had declined. Arthur, J., “Development and crime in Africa: a test of modernisation theory”, (1991) 19 Journal of Criminal Justice, 499.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹¹² Ibid., 211.

¹¹³ One of the aims of the UN African Institute for the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders (UNAFRI), established in 1989, was to promote international action against transnational organized and economic crime. See Shaidi, L. P., “The role of UNAFRI in the ninth UN Congress on the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders: an Overview”, [1995] J.A.L. 183. UNAFRI has now closed down.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹¹⁴ See the discussion in Nsereko, op. cit. The 1996 SADC Protocol on Illicit Drug Trafficking is an important example of such co-operation.

¹¹⁵ For example, in an attempt to tackle gangs which steal property, particularly motor-vehicles, in South Africa and smuggle them into Botswana, Botswana created a new offence (Penal Code s. 320) of “being found in possession of property stolen or unlawfully obtained from outside Botswana”.

¹¹⁶ The 1988 Vienna Convention against Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances, to which the majority of Commonwealth African states are parties, required states to criminalize money-laundering of drugs proceeds. Nigeria complied. See n. 45 above.

¹¹⁷ An example is provided by the 1996 Southern and Eastern African Money Laundering Conference, attended by all the Commonwealth countries of the region. See [1997] J.A.L. 150 for a note on the conference.