Features of Constitution1
|Is there a constitution?||Yes|
|Does the constitution provide for freedom of religion?||Yes|
|Last Amended||As of 5/11/2011, last amendment was made in 2010|
|Source||World Intellectual Property Organization|
|Translation||Unofficial translation by ARDA staff from French source|
|Current as of||2009 (2010 amendment not included)|
Constitution Excerpts (clauses that reference religion)2
All human beings are equal before the law regardless of gender, ethnicity, religion, political affiliation and social position.
Freedom of conscience, of assembly, and the free exercise of religion are guaranteed in all conditions set by law. Any forms of religious fundamentalism and intolerance are prohibited.
The Republic guarantees every citizen the right to work, a healthy environment, rest and recreation in accordance with the requirements of national development. She provides the conditions for development by an efficient employment policy.
All citizens are equal before their employment. No person may be prejudiced in their work or employment because of their origins, sex, opinions or beliefs.
Political parties and groups contribute to the exercise of suffrage, and political, economic, and social life.
They are formed and operate freely, and they are obliged to respect the principles of democracy, unity and national sovereignty, human rights, secularity and the republican form of government under laws and regulations.
They are prohibited from identifying with a particular race, ethnicity, gender, religion, sect, language, region, or armed group.
…Upon taking office, standing with the left hand on the Constitution and the right hand raised, the President of the Republic takes the following oath before the Constitutional Court sitting in solemnity:
"I swear to God and to the nation to carefully observe the constitution, to ensure the sustainability and independence of the Republic, to safeguard the integrity of the territory, to preserve the peace, to strengthen national unity, to ensure the welfare of the Central African people, to conscientiously fulfill my duties without any consideration of ethnic, regional, or denominational order, to never exert the powers reserved for me by the Constitution for personal purposes, and to be guided by the national interest and by the dignity of the Central African people.
1. Data under the "Features of Constitution" heading are drawn from coding of the U.S. State Department's 2008 International Religious Freedom Reports conducted by researchers at the Association of Religion Data Archives. The article by Brian Grim and Roger Finke describes the coding of the International Religious Freedom reports. A dataset with these and the other international measures highlighted on the country pages can be downloaded from this website. Used with permission.
2. The constitutional excerpts shown above are reproduced from the websites given in the "Source" field; the links to these websites were active as of May 2011. Where the constitutional text shown on these websites was provided in a language other than English, this text was translated to English by ARDA staff with assistance from web-based translation utilities such as Google Translate and Yahoo! Babel Fish. Constitutional text was converted to American English where applicable. Constitutional clauses were judged to contain religious content based largely on the standards used in the construction of the Religion and State Constitutions Dataset collected by Jonathan Fox. Emphases were added to the text by ARDA staff to highlight religious content in articles that also contain content that does not pertain to matters of religion. The data on this page were correct to the best of the knowledge of the ARDA as of the date listed in the "Current as of" field shown above. Please contact us at email@example.com if you are aware of any incorrect information provided on this page.