Constitutional Amendment

The constitutional amendment shall be decided on the initiative of the President of the Republic.

It shall be voted in identical terms by the People’s National Assembly and the Council of the Nation in the same conditions as a legislative text.

It shall be submitted by referendum to the approval of the people within fifty (50) days of its adoption.

The constitutional amendment, approved by the people, shall be promulgated by the President of the Republic.

An Act pertaining to a draft constitutional amendment shall become null and void if rejected by the people.

It cannot be resubmitted to the people during the same legislature.

If according to the reasoned opinion of the Constitutional Court the draft constitutional amendment in no way infringes upon the general principles governing the Algerian society, the human and citizen’s rights and freedoms, and does not alter in any manner the fundamental balance of the powers and the institutions, the President of the Republic may directly promulgate the law containing the constitutional amendment without submitting it to referendum, if it has been approved by three-quarters (3/4) of the votes of the members of the two Chambers of Parliament.

Three-quarters (3/4) of the members of the two Chambers of Parliament, meeting in joint session, may propose a constitutional amendment and present it to the President of the Republic, who may submit it to a referendum.

If its approval is obtained, it shall be promulgated.

No constitutional amendment shall undermine:

1. the Republican character of the State;

2. the democratic order based on a multi-party system;

3. Islam as the religion of the State;

4. Arabic as the national and official language;

5. Tamazight as a national and official language;

6. the fundamental freedoms and the human and citizens’ rights;

7. the integrity and unity of the national territory;

8. the national emblem and the national anthem as symbols of the Revolution and the Republic;

9. the prohibition against holding more than two consecutive or discontinuous presidential terms of five years each.