By Oluayode Oyeleye
In two years’ time the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) will clock 50. Historically, the reasons behind the poor status of ECOWAS today are understandable. It was a creation of despots, just as the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) much earlier in 1963. Many founding members had to be booted out of office for overstaying their welcome. Both ECOWAS and the African Union (AU) — formerly OAU — have remained. and have been sustained as clubs of despots. The ECOWAS in particular has been a non-performing regional economic bloc (REC) like most others in Africa.
For instance, SADC, ECCAS, EAC, AMU and IGAD have been existing mostly in names only. Their impacts on the continent are largely disputable. They have failed in most instances when they are needed most. Recently, when the battle for the soul of Khartoum began in April 15, 2023, the current head of IGAD – a Sudanese – was away from the scene of crisis. IGAD has been unable to mediate and the AU was unable to raise $85 million to support Sudan, according to President William Ruto of Kenya.
ECOWAS has not been able to prioritise or pursue one key regional political or economic issue of common interest to any appreciable extent and its scorecard of achievements is filled with blank spaces. The regional ECOWAS military intervention it once had under the codename ECOMOG was a disappointment as the soldiers were sometimes accused of committing atrocities on their mission field during deployment.
The idea of a regional currency called the ECO, would have been a landmark achievement in line with the regional body’s name as an economic community. But it was a stillborn, conceived in the year 2000 but yet to take off as of 2023 and work on it has been postponed till 2027. It is a fact that – as will be seen later in this write-up – that a failed attempt was made by France to hijack the ECO through the backdoor, using WAEMU countries sometimes about three years ago.
So, what is really the raison d’etre for ECOWAS other than as an elite club of despotic national political leaders of countries in the West African sub-region? By their actions and inactions, the split of ECOWAS was predictable much earlier since the members were unable to intelligently manage the increasingly complex social, political or economic challenges in the sub-region. Not all the frontline members of the club practise true democracy as Faure Gnassingbé of Togo is a child of political dynasty, Alassane Ouattara is on an illegitimate third term in Côte d’Ivoire and Macky Sall is actively persecuting his strongest political rival to preclude him from contesting the 2024 election in Senegal.
Response to the Mali coup, the first in the series of coups in the Sahel since 2020, was poorly managed by ECOWAS. Rather than treating the underlying issues around the first coup orchestrated by Col. Assimi Goita with understanding, the hasty pronouncement of sanctions did more harm than good. The same happened with those that followed – in Guinea Conakry, Burkina Faso and Niger Republic.
The slamming of sanctions and the isolation of those countries immediately widened the hitherto existing cracks within ECOWAS. Worse still, those other countries that came together to pronounce sanctions have unwittingly expedited the widening of the long-existing crack. They failed to gauge the impact and forced those countries that were taken over by military leaders to seek alliances elsewhere, away from their traditional and historical allies. Before the coups, ECOWAS has been operating at two levels and under two different arrangements. The West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU) member countries – essentially all francophone except Guinea Bissau – operated a different system of economy and custom union tied to France.
Their CFA common currency was regulated from France and over 60 per cent of their common external reserves were kept in France till 2000, and to the European Central Bank thereafter upon France’s accession to EU and Eurozone membership till now. WAEMU has therefore not been an African economy but a puppet of France and Europe. It is not surprising that the EU is now concerned with the developments in the francophone Africa, generally in the wake of recent waves of coups and change in countries’ alliances, tending more to the East.
WAEMU countries are now becoming impatient with France, their colonial master that changed only in the style of colonialism but not the content. The CFA currency is now being openly questioned as colonial tax, as said by the President of Benin Republic, Patrice Talon. More francophone countries in West and Central Africa are beginning to align with Talon’s views and would like to see things change from the status quo.
It means the future of CFA in both West and Central Africa is bleak. That is unsettling to France. Moreover, France’s economy has been sustained by commodities from their African colonies, and it is still so today. It looks rather unlikely that France any realistic alternative to the continued plundering of its African quasi-independent countries. The resources they take from Africa involve some agricultural products called cash crops and minerals produced or extracted solely for export to France.
If there is any major reason ECOWAS has been a toothless regional bloc, so much has to do with the behind-the-curtain puppet manipulation by France. The insensitive sit-tight rulers of ECOWAS chose to impose an ineffectual set of sanctions on Mali that was as bad as cutting off an itching finger to punish the finger and stop the itchy feeling. They made it worse by doing the same to more of the countries taken over subsequently by military junta.
Mali’s junta knew that the sanctions were going to be of mutually hurtful effects on Mali and other ECOWAS countries. This was a reality the club members of ECOWAS turned a blind eye on and would not publicly acknowledge while playing macho, pretending to be strong. Their poor regional hostile diplomacy has only worsened the prospects of ECOWAS.
With their failure to make any noticeable impact, it was easy for Guinea, Burkina Faso and Niger junta to ignore them. By this, ECOWAS politicians have basically fallen into the traps of those military leaders. This has exposed their frank like in the proverbial wind that blew and exposed the chicken’s vent. It can only get worse. ECOWAS might very well be on its way to disintegration as unfolding events will prove. The alliance formed by last week by those military leaders of Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger could be the trigger that was needed to hasten the collapse of both ECOWAS and WAEMU.
Three things will facilitate the break-up of ECOWAS. First is the internal weaknesses of the various constituent member states politically and economically. Long before the coming on board of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), the subregion had the ECOWAS Trade Liberalisation Scheme (ETLS). It has not worked. It has been rather abused to the disadvantage of some bigger economies, particularly Nigeria. Under its perverted implementation, goods meant for Nigeria as a final destination from outside Africa are often imported into neighbouring Benin Republic to take advantage of lower tariff and then subjected to transshipment to Nigeria under the ETLS tariff waiver.
Such a trading arrangement does not evenly distribute benefits of sub-regional free trade to all participant countries. Despite ETLS, Ghana and Nigeria — two biggest economies in the subregion — have been involved in high-wired protectionism, with Nigeria closing its border with Benin in a trade war aimed at Ghana between August 2020 and December 2021.
The crack in the house of françafrique became evident with the loss of grip by France. It has become clear that France can no longer bring all the francophone countries together and drive them like a herd of cattle. More and more countries are now seeking security refuge under Russia while calling the bluff of France. The humiliation faced by France in recent times is further made worse by the fierce but subtle contest for Africa between the West and the East and the renewed strategic approach of the US in trying to displace France in those francophone countries where the latter traditionally has a foothold.
With the recent hide-and-seek game of the US in France after the recent coup, one thing is clear. That is the fact that France is losing hold of its colonies while the US is gaining ground. It won’t be too long when France will be practically driven out of many African countries, making ways of politicians. A number of important and remarkable events will occur in quick succession. Françafrique will wane, ECOWAS will utterly collapse and WAEMU will follow. These may happen sooner than anyone can guess. But their happening looks so certain
Dr. Oyeleye is a public analyst and commentator