Mauritania Approves Abolition of Country's Senate

President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz of Mauritania.

Mauritania has approved the abolition of the Upper legislative House, the Senate. This follows President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz’s signing into law a newly drafted bill abolishing the Senate.

The abolition of the Senate was the most controversial measure in a package of reforms passed by referendum this month.

According to media reports, the Mauritanian Minister of Information, Mohamed Lemine Ould Cheikh, said the law was passed the same day the constitutional council cleared the results of the referendum in which 85 percent of those who voted approved the measure.

However, the official turnout figure for the vote was 53.73 percent of the country’s population, as senators and opposition politicians who campaigned against the changes had called for a boycott of the vote.

Opposition groups who opposed the abolition of the senate alleged the President was laying the groundwork for a third term in power, despite his claims to the contrary.

With this development, Mauritania has become the second West African country that has abolished its Senate, after Senegal, its southern neighbour took a similar step in 2012  to maintain a Unicameral Legislature following President Macky Sall announcement of the abolition of the country’s Senate and return to a unicameral chamber. In the midst of serious flooding, he said that scrapping the Senate would save money that would then be directed toward flood prevention: "the relief of the suffering of the people is more important than the Senate, for us to stop the floods that cyclically affect our country."

In Mauritania, President Aziz came to power in a coup in 2008, before being elected in 2009 and again for a second five-year term in 2014.

Source: www.dailypost.ng