Tourism / Transport

Politics

The politics of Mayotte takes place in a framework of a parliamentary representative democratic French local government, whereby the President of the Departmental Council is the head of the local assembly, and of a multi-party system. Executive power is exercised by the French government.

Mayotte also sends one deputy to the French National Assembly and two senators to the French Senate.

Mayotte is an overseas department and region of France officially named Département de Mayotte. Unlike the other overseas regions and departments of France, Mayotte possesses a single local assembly, officially called the "departmental council" (conseil départemental), which acts both as a regional and departmental council.

The situation of Mayotte proved to be awkward for France: while the local population very largely did not want to be independent from France and join the Comoros, some international criticism from post-colonial leftist regimes was heard about Mayotte's ongoing ties to France. Furthermore, the peculiar local administration of Mayotte, largely ruled by customary Muslim law, would be difficult to integrate into the legal structures of France, not to mention the costs of bringing the standards of living to levels close to those of Metropolitan France. For these reasons, the laws passed by the national parliament had to state specifically that they applied to Mayotte for them to be applicable on Mayotte.

The status of Mayotte was changed in 2001 towards one very close to the status of the Departments of France, with the particular designation of departmental collectivity. This change was approved by 73% of voters in a referendum. After the constitutional reform of 2003 it became an overseas collectivity while retaining the title "departmental collectivity" of Mayotte.

Mayotte became an overseas department of France (département d'outre-mer, DOM) on 31 March 2011 following the result of the March 2009 Mahoran status referendum, which was overwhelmingly approved by around 95% of voters. Becoming an overseas department will mean it will adopt the same legal and social system as used in the rest of France. This will require abandoning some customary laws, adopting the standard French civil code, and reforming the judiciary, educational, social and fiscal systems, and will take place over a period of about 20 years.

Despite its domestic constitutional evolution from the status of an overseas collectivity to that of an overseas department, effectively becoming a full constituent territory within the French Republic, with regards to the European Union, Mayotte remained an 'Overseas country and territory' (OCT) in association with the Union (as per Article 355(2) TFEU) and not a constituent territory of the European Union in the same way as the other four overseas departments. However following a directive of the European Council in December 2013, Mayotte became an outermost region of the European Union on 1 January 2014. This successful agreement between the 27 member states follows a petition made by the French government for Mayotte to become an integral territory of the European Union nonetheless benefiting from the derogation clause applicable in existing Outermost regions, namely Article 349 TFEU, as favoured in a June 2012 European Commission opinion on Mayotte's European constitutional status.

Administrative divisions

Mayotte is divided into 17 communes. There are also 13 cantons (not shown here). There are no arrondissements.

Transport

• Waterways
  • Ferry between Dzaoudzi and Mamoudzou.
• Highways:
  • total: 93 kilometres (58 mi)
    • paved : 72 kilometres (45 mi)
    • unpaved : 21 kilometres (13 mi)
• Ports and harbours:
  • Dzaoudzi
  • "Longoni" (Koungou)
• Airports: Dzaoudzi Pamandzi International Airport - the only airport in Mayotte
  • with paved runways: 1 (2002)

Economy

The official currency in Mayotte is the euro.

In 2013, the GDP of Mayotte at market exchange rates was €1.785 billion. In that same year the GDP per capita of Mayotte at market exchange rates, not at PPP, was €8,200, which was 12.5 times higher than the GDP per capita of the Comoros that year, but only 41% of the GDP per capita of Réunion and 25% of the GDP per capita of Metropolitan France.