Benin – Creation of the Senate: Boni Yayi’s request to the 22 deputies of the Les Démocrates party
In a statement made public on the night of Monday, November 3, 2025, former president Thomas Boni Yayi strongly opposed the bill to create a Senate. He urges the deputies of the party Les Démocrates to use their blocking minority to reject this initiative, which he calls “anti-democratic”.
SUMMARY
“Through the press I was informed of the filing in the National Assembly of a bill amending the Constitution. It aims to create an institution called the Senate.”, thus begins the statement of the former president of the Republic, Thomas Boni Yayi, published on the night of Monday, November 3, 2025.
For the former head of state, this initiative “does not contribute to strengthening our democracy”. He believes that, undertaken “without a national consensus,” it “fits into a climate of exclusion that undermines social cohesion and compromises the calm of the republican debate.”
In his statement Boni Yayi denounces an approach he considers untimely and illegitimate. “The creation of a Senate is neither timely nor legitimate. It constitutes an anti-democratic initiative, contrary to the fundamental principles of the separation of powers and to the proper functioning of our institutions.”, he said.
“Let’s reject any alteration of the institutional balance”
Continuing his statement, the honorary president of the party Les Démocrates questions the composition and function of the future institution, which he considers “designed to serve a single man, disregarding the public interest”.
“I could in no way be part of this institution as an ex officio member nor endorse such a project, whose true aim seems to be to change the very nature of our political system.”
For Boni Yayi, “such an institutional drift endangers the democratic gains dearly won by the Beninese people at the cost of so many sacrifices.” That is why he makes a solemn appeal to the remaining deputies of the party Les Démocrates, of which he is the president.
“I solemnly call on the deputies of the party Les Démocrates to reject this proposed constitutional amendment creating the Senate. By doing so, the 22 LD deputies will honor their oath as architects of the restoration of democracy in Benin, at this final ordinary session of the 9th legislature. Through their blocking minority, they will have the merit of returning the voice to the people, the only legitimate sovereign, through the referendum — the supreme expression of the national will“, Boni Yayi asked.
The former president of Benin also invited the 22 deputies to defend “together (…) our democracy and our national unity”. “Let’s refuse any alteration of the institutional balance that threatens our shared way of life and the future of our Nation. Together let’s save the homeland. God bless Benin”, he said.
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