Senegal's Constitutional Council (the country's highest court) has invalidated a constitutional revision law passed by the National Assembly on 29 June, ruling on 9 July that it violated several articles of the constitution. The reform, which would have amended 29 articles of the founding text, sought to bar the president from leading a political party, strengthen the powers of parliament and the prime minister, and replace the Constitutional Council with a nine-member Constitutional Court. President Bassirou Diomaye Faye had himself referred the legislation to the court, citing procedural violations — a move that amounts to a political victory for him over National Assembly speaker Ousmane Sonko, whose Pastef party had driven the reform, and which leaves Faye free to introduce his own version of the changes and put it to a referendum.