Malians are voting for a new draft constitution Sunday in a referendum that the country's coup leader Colonel Assimi Goita has said will pave the way for new elections in 2024, but critics have called it a delaying tactic to prolong his stay in power, The Associated Press reports.
In a message broadcast on state television ahead of the vote, Goita told Malians that the suggested draft constitution “provides for a better-organized executive power, while maintaining the necessary balance with the legislative power.”

Imam Mahmoud Dicko, the opponent of the military junta, invited his supporters to Mali's capital Bamako on Friday to ask them to vote against it.
“In our country today, can we speak of justice, democracy, human rights, the rule of law? What kind of democracy are we talking about? Where is it? What rule of law is there in a country where justice is used by the military to repress people? That’s the reality of this country today,” Dicko said.
The current constitution, dated 1992, states that “the government determines and conducts the policy of the nation,” whereas according to the new constitution, the government “conducts the policy of the nation determined by the president.”