always recalled that it is not a body set up with a mandate for settling cases whose subject matter is the interpretation of the law or the Constitution of the Member States of ECOWAS. Two effects arise therefrom. 25.The first is that the present judicial argumentation must be devoid of every form of reliance on the domestic law, be it on the Constitution of Burkina Faso, or on any norms whatsoever related to the Constitution of Burkina Faso. In their written pleadings, the Applicants indeed made reference to both the Constitution of Burkina Faso (Article 1) and the Charter of Transition (Article 1). Such references shall be deemed as inappropriate before the judges of the ECOWAS Court of Justice. As an International Court, its mandate is restricted to sanctioning States’ disregard for the obligations arising from the international texts binding on them. 26. The second effect is that there can be no question, in the instant case, of seeking to examine the meaning which must be ascribed to the new Article 135 of the Burkina Faso Electoral Code. It is tempting, given the relative ambiguity of the text complained of, to engage in a legal exegesis of the Burkina Faso Electoral Code, to ascribe to it a certain meaning, or to orient the construction of that domestic law along a given path. 27. The Court cannot of course undertake such a task, which would be diametrically opposed to its principled position recalled above. The Court still holds that, neither in the instant case nor in the ones which preceded it, will its function consist of seeking to discover the intention of the national lawmaker, or of competing with the domestic courts, within their own scope of jurisdiction, which, precisely, consists of interpreting their own national texts. But the Court assumes its rightful powers where the interprétation or application of the national text aims at depriving the citizens of rights embedded in international instruments to which Burkina Faso is a party. 28. The Court holds that there is no doubt that the exclusion of the political parties and citizens from the forthcoming electoral race is discriminatory and hardly justifiable in law. It may certainly occur that in specific circumstances, the laws of a country may debar access of certain citizens or organisations from certain elective functions. But the restriction of such 10