(Ecofin Agency) - The Court of Justice of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) invalidated, on 13 July, the new election code of Burkina Faso, which prevents followers of the deposed president Blaise Compaoré from standing as candidates in the presidential elections in October. The court considered that the provisions of this electoral code are a violation of the right to freely partake in the elections.

The representatives of the National Council of Transition (CNT), the interim parliament in Burkina Faso, voted in April, a revision of the electoral code making ineligible people who supported an unconstitutional change to the principle of alternating political power. This is a way, in other words, of eliminating from politics all those who supported the attempt to revise the Constitution in October 2014, to allow Mr Compaoré to stand for re-election.

Seven political parties from Burkina referred the matter to the ECOWAS Court of justice, including Mr Compaoré’s Congress for Democracy and Progress (CDP). Burkina Faso, as a member of ECOWAS, is bound by the regional court’s decisions.

According to Sunny Ugoh, spokesperson for ECOWAS, the decision issued by the West African court is final and irrevocable.