Yearbook 2009
Burkina Faso. In April, Parliament passed several new electoral laws, including one that at least 30 percent of the political parties’ candidates must be women. The new laws also gave Burkinis foreign citizens the right to vote and clarified the rules that an opposition leader should be elected after elections. In addition, all parties with at least three percent of the votes in the previous election must receive state support for their election campaigns.
Following a government decision, the authorities began issuing a free birth certificate in May. The comprehensive program, supported by the United Nations Children’s Fund UNICEF, was expected to provide five million burkinis with the important documents that were too expensive for many in the past. According to countryaah, proof of birth is required to, among other things, be able to go to school, get access to care and to vote. Children without a birth certificate are at greater risk of being subjected to trafficking and child marriage. One third of the country’s three million children lacked a birth certificate when the program started.
Flooding as a result of the strongest rainfall since 1919 resulted in at least five dead and 150,000 homeless people in early September. The worst hit was the capital Ouagadougou, where even the largest university hospital was flooded and forced to evacuate its patients.