Senegal's Constitution

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Basic data
Title: Constitution of the Republic of Senegal
Short title: Constitution du Sénégal
Type: Constitution
Scope: Senegal
Legal matter: Constitutional law
Issued on: January 22, 2001
Entry into force on: January 22, 2001
Last change by: 5th April 2016
Effective date of the
last change: 		5th April 2016
Please note the note on the applicable legal version.

The Constitution of Senegal (Constitution du Sénégal) is in force since January 22, 2001 Constitution of Senegal .

history

Before the present constitution, Senegal already had three other constitutions, which came into force in 1959, 1960 and 1963.

Today's constitution was passed in a referendum that was carried out on January 7, 2001 at the instigation of President Abdoulaye Wade, who had been elected a year earlier . The constitution proposal received 94.0% of the valid votes and was announced on January 22nd in the Journal officiel as Loi n ° 2001–03 du 22 janvier 2001 portant Constitution , with which the new constitution came into force.

With the constitutional law of April 5, 2016, the constitution was changed for the last time after a referendum that took place on March 20, 2016. The term of office of the President of the Republic was set at five years. He can only be re-elected once.

Content and structure

The constitutional text is divided into 108 articles, which are summarized in 13 sections as follows:

  • Title I. On the state and sovereignty.
  • Title II. On civil liberties and human rights , on economic and social rights and equality .
  • Title III. From the President of the Republic.
  • Title IV. By the Government.
  • Title V. From the opposition .
  • Title VI. From parliament.
  • Title VII. On the relationship between the executive and legislative branches.
  • Title VII-I. From the Economic and Social Council.
  • Title VIII. From the judiciary.
  • Title IX. From international treaties.
  • Title X. From the Supreme Court.
  • Title XI. From the local authorities.
  • Title XII. From the amendment of the constitution.
  • Title XIII. Transitional provisions.

Constitutional bodies

Since 2016 the constitutional authorities of the republic (constitutional organs) are the following:

Consolidated constitutional text

Although the constitutional text has been fundamentally changed several times since 2001, there has been no coordinated work by the competent authorities on a uniform version of the current constitutional text. Since there were several versions in circulation that differed significantly in terms of content, there were different views on the wording and interpretation of constitutional articles, which led to a certain legal uncertainty.

In view of this situation, the Constitutional Council decided, in accordance with the principle of legal certainty it laid down on February 12, 2016, to compile and consolidate. The aim of such an undertaking is, on the one hand, to determine the constitution-amending laws that have been passed so far and, on the other hand, to take into account the changes made by them in order to obtain an up-to-date text that corresponds exactly to the will of the constitution.

In this update process, the Constitutional Council endeavored to incorporate the amendments passed by the constitutional laws, as published in the Journal officiel of the Republic of Senegal, in the order of their date in the consolidated version of the constitutional text. He has taken care to indicate the number and date of publication in the Journal officiel in the article containing the provisions concerned for each integrated change .

Reading this version reveals many shortcomings in the constitutional laws. However, the Constitutional Council, aware of the limits of its powers, did not want to replace the constitution-making power and therefore deliberately refrained from correcting these deficiencies.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Digithèque, Jean-Pierre Maury: Senegal's constitutional historical data, as of July 2009
  2. ↑ NATLEX: Loi n ° 2001-03 du 22 janvier 2001 portant Constitution
  3. ↑ Loi constitutionnelle n ° 2016-10 from 05 April 2016
  4. ↑ Consolidated constitutional text: loi n ° 2001-03 du 22 Janvier 2001 portant Constitution, modified