President Faustin-Archange Touadera has set July 30 as the date for a proposed referendum on a new constitution for the Central African Republic that would allow him to seek for a new term in 2025.
“I have decided … to submit this project for a new constitution to a referendum,” the president said in an address to the nation, posted on Facebook, on Tuesday.
Touadera was elected in 2016 and was returned for a second term in 2020 despite widespread accusations of electoral flaws and an ongoing rebellion against his rule after years of civil war.
Currently, a president can serve only two four-year terms.
His allies proposed the rule change in May last year, arguing that presidential term limits were uncommon in many neighbouring countries. Critics and opposition parties held protests last year as the reform would allow Touadera to run again in 2025 for a third term.
The president installed a commission to draft the proposed changes in September. But the country’s top court ruled the committee unconstitutional and annulled it.
In January, Touadera removed the country’s top judge, Daniele Darlan, in what critics denounced as a “constitutional coup d’etat” for her opposition to the presidential decrees aimed at revising the constitution.
