Comorian constitutional referendum, 2009

The constitutional referendum in the Comoros in 2009 took place on 17 May 2009. Voters should vote on a new constitution, which should reduce the government bureaucracy of the islands in the opinion of its proponents, according to its opponents, however, posed a threat to democracy in the country and the autonomy of the main islands. After a call for a boycott of the opposition, the new constitution was adopted with 93.9 % agreement with a voter turnout of just over 50 % of the vote.

Changes by the new Constitution

The old constitution of 2001 was also financially very costly attempt to create a political balance between the three main islands of the country. Each island had a semi-autonomous parliament with a president at the top and the presidency of the state as a whole was rotated between the islands.

The Constitution, adopted by referendum other hand, sees the following changes:

• From the President of the main islands are governors with lower influence
• From the Ministers of the individual island governments are losing their rank and become officers
• Of the 33 seats of the total parliament only 9 seats are indirectly occupied by the parliaments of the main islands (compared with 15 under the old constitution ) and elected 24 seats directly ( as opposed to 18 in the old system )
• The term of office of the President should be extended to five ( instead of four ) years.
• The President was given the right to dissolve parliament
• In the new constitution, Islam is declared the state religion

The heavily criticized for extending the term of the President, the election would have made necessary only in 2011, was revoked by the Constitutional Court in May 2010, so that the next presidential elections in the Comoros by rotation in 2010 took place and President Ahmed Abdallah Sambi had to stand for re-election until 2011. The parliamentary elections in the Comoros in 2009 were taking place in accordance with the requirements of the new Constitution.