Leaders of ECOWAS on Wednesday celebrated 50 years since its formation, reflecting on regional security challenges and internal fractures as Africa as a whole also seeks answers in the face of US trade tariffs and aid cuts.The anniversary comes at one of the worst of moments in recent years for the Economic Community of West African States, which was once internationally respected as a force for stability.Three junta-led countries Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger quit the bloc earlier this year.ECOWAS is also grappling with its security challenges with jihadists exploiting strained relationships between members and gaining ground in the Sahel and Lake Chad region. Benin and Nigeria have experienced a wave of attacks in recent months. And the Sahel region was in 2024 ranked the epicentre of global “terrorism” for the second straight year, accounting for more than half of deaths put down to terror attacks worldwide, according to the Global Terrorism Index published in March.Coups and attempted putsches have rocked nearly half of the original ECOWAS countries in the last decade, putting democracy on the ropes and straining relations among neighbours.Retired General Yakubu Gowon, 90, Nigeria’s former military leader and the only surviving co-founder of the organisation, was confident the trio would return to the ECOWAS fold.”In recent years, we have witnessed the troubling resurgence of military coups in some of our member states. We thought that was over, but it seems as though personal ambition drives some people to do the wrong thing,” he said in an address to the gathering at a Lagos hotel.”Our sister nations that have chosen to exit the community may in time reconsider their decision, as the bonds of history, culture, and shared destiny remain unbroken”.”I am confident that with goodwill and sincere engagement, they will find a reason to return to ECOWAS family, stronger, more united, and committed to our common vision for West Africa””I believe, sooner or later, they will… come back.”Nigeria’s Foreign Minister Yusuf Tuggar also expressed confidence the three countries that have since formed their own grouping “will return in the future”.The departure of the three countries from ECOWAS dealt a blow to the bloc’s credibility and regional influence, experts say.The exit “is a major dent on this organisation’s capacity to harness the optimism and hopes of its birth”, said Kwesi Aning, an expert in international cooperation at the Accra-based Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre.”It reflects a disastrous level of leadership amongst ECOWAS leaders,” he added.- Turmoil and trade -Speakers avoided mentioning US tariffs but the head the ECOWAS Commission, Omar Alieu Touray, made reference to “the emergence of geopolitical competition and rivalry, the mounting economic difficulties as a result of uncertainties in the global political and economic order”.The challenges, he said, underscored the need to “strengthen our unity and cooperate”.ECOWAS “finds itself at a critical juncture between its foundational aspirations of economic integration and peace and the stark realities of regional insecurity, democratic backsliding, and internal fragmentation”, said SBM Intelligence in a report released Wednesday.The impact of the turmoil on trade among countries is stark.Before relations between neighbours Nigeria and Niger soured following a coup in Niamey in July 2023, Nigerian traders shipped out several truckloads of edible grains from the bustling Dawanau market in the northwestern state of Kano daily.While the volume of grains supplied from the Kano market into Niger has not changed much, it is the cost of doing so that is now biting.Traders and truckers told AFP in Kano that taxes paid on Nigerian goods imported into Niger have increased fivefold, fuelling a spike in smuggling activities across porous borders.”We were paying an equivalent of 100,000 naira (about $64) as import duty on each truck before they left ECOWAS, but we now pay around 500,000 naira,” said 40-year-old trucker Aliyu Abubakar.
