A constitutional referendum was held in the Comoros on 17 May 2009. The constitutional amendments were approved with 93.9% in favour, with a turnout of 51.8%.

Background

President

Ahmed Abdallah Mohamed Sambi Sayyid Ahmed Abdallah Mohamed Sambi ( ar, أحمد عبدالله محمد سامبي, born 5 June 1958) is a Comoros, Comorian Islamic leader and politician, and former President of Comoros. He is popularly known as 'Ayatollah'. After easily winni ...

proposed extending his term for two years in order to hold all elections simultaneously in 2011, as well as to reform the

constitutional A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organisation or other type of entity and commonly determine how that entity is to be governed. When these princip ...

structure of the Comoros to save money. However, opposition parties and those from other islands were opposed to this, seeing it as a ploy to extend his term of office at the expense of the other two islands. Other constitutional amendments would make Islam the state religion and downgrade the status of the presidents of the constituent islands to governors, as well as allowing the president to dissolve the

Assembly of the Union The Pyidaungsu Hluttaw ( my, ပြည်ထောင်စု လွှတ်တော် lit. Assembly of the Union) is the ''de jure'' national-level bicameral legislature of Myanmar (officially known as the ''Republic of the Union of My ...

.COMOROS: Reforming 'the coup-coup islands'
IRIN, 25 February 2009 The referendum was originally scheduled for 22 March 2009, but was postponed due to disagreements over the content.

Results

References

{{africa-election-stub 2009 referendums

2009 File:2009 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: The vertical stabilizer of Air France Flight 447 is pulled out from the Atlantic Ocean; Barack Obama becomes the first African American to become President of the United States; 2009 Iran ...

2009 in the Comoros Constitutional referendums in the Comoros