The law has yet to be promulgated by the President of the Republic, Faustin Archange Touadéra.
Article written by
Posted
Reading time : 1 min.
The result of the vote was announced to applause. The Central African National Assembly voted Friday, May 27 the abolition of the death penalty, in a country in civil war where the last capital execution dates back to 1981. The law must still be promulgated by the President of the Republic, Faustin Archange Touadéra .
The Central African Republic, the second poorest country in the world according to the UN, has been ravaged since 2013 by a civil war which has nevertheless considerably decreased in intensity since 2018. The Central African Republic joins the list of African countries which have abolished the death penalty these last years on the continent, after Chad in 2020, and Sierra Leone in 2021.
A country of around 5.5 million inhabitants with a quasi-failed rule of law, the Central African Republic is bloodied by decades of civil wars, the last of which began 9 years ago.
At the end of 2020, the most powerful of the many armed groups which then shared two-thirds of the territory had launched an offensive on the capital Bangui shortly before the elections. President Faustin Archange Touadéra then called on Moscow to help his helpless army. Since the beginning of 2021, the Central African forces and their Russian allies have driven back the rebels from a large part of the territories and cities they controlled, without however being able to reinstall everywhere and permanently the presence and the authority of the State.