Nine months after a military coup interrupted elections already underway, Guinea-Bissau stands at a constitutional crossroads — asked to ratify, before it can freely choose its leaders, the very rules those leaders will govern by. The proposed charter would concentrate executive power in the presidency, shrink parliament, and raise barriers to political entry, all drafted not by elected representatives but by a transitional military authority. It is a familiar tension in the long human story of post-colonial governance: the question of who gets to write the rules, and for whom.