By Joseph Fitzgerald Kamara, Esq.
The debate surrounding the Constitution of Sierra Leone (Amendment) Act, 2025 has taken a dangerously pedestrian turn. Proposals to interpret the “votes of not less than two-thirds of Members of Parliament” as merely a majority of those present are not just legally lazy; they are an assault on constitutional fidelity.
Section 108(2)(b) is explicit. It requires the votes of two-thirds of the entire membership of Parliament. This is not an abstract number; it is a fixed threshold rooted in the principle that constitutional amendments must enjoy a supermajority consensus of the whole House, not just a quorate slice of it.
To argue otherwise is to suggest that if only half the MPs show up, a simple majority of that rump could bind the nation. That logic turns a supermajority requirement into a farce. It confuses the quorum rules for ordinary business with the heightened safeguard designed to protect the Constitution from partisan whims.
We must not dilute the sovereignty of the Constitution with the arithmetic of convenience. The “votes” are not a percentage of a subset; they are a fixed number. Any amendment passing on a lesser calculation is not just procedurally wrong but constitutionally dead.