With the promulgation of the new constitution, the...

With the promulgation of the new constitution, the Ivory Coast formally abolished the death penalty. In fact, Article 2 of the new Constitution, approvata con il referendum del 23 e 24 luglio, stipulates that: ''toute sanction tendant à la privation de la vie humaine est interdite'' (''all penalties resulting in the deprivation of human life are prohibited''). Under Ivorian law the Constitution takes precedence over penal law, thus courts can no longer hand down death sentences. The new constitution foresees the lowering of the voting age from 21 to 18 years, prohibits the mutilation of genital parts, and safeguards other political and civil rights. Côte d'Ivoire has been abolitionist in practice for several decades although the death penalty remained on the statute books. Murder, treason and desertion were capital crimes. In 1995, the National Assembly approved a law extending the death penalty to robbery with violence and allowing for public executions, but the President at the time, Henri Konan Bédié, has never promulgated the law.