ECOWAS and Africa at the Crossroads: Which way forward?

The old adage goes like this: “history repeats itself because no one learns from it.” Africa needs to seriously reflect on its past, analyse its current realities and importantly, boldly carve a brighter vision for its citizens that would realise its developmental aspirations, change the gloomy outlook and become a respected member of the global community.

Again, they say “time and tide waits for no man,” therefore Africa needs to decide its future course now, else forever remain at the bottom of the pile of every conceivable matrix.

A careful analysis shows that visionary leadership and political unity remain the viable options for Africa to rise above the grinding poverty, instability, the continuing threats and spread of terrorism, and the strangle-hold of foreign actors on Africa’s resources and its justifiable sustainable development.

The time for bold visionary leadership and action is now. The question is will African leaders rise up to the occasion.

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.”

William Butler Yeats Irish Poet & Writer (1865–1939) - “The Second Coming Poem.”

Introduction 

Looking at what is happening in the Sahelian and West African sub regions - the continuing threats and spread of terrorism, the incessant banditry, killing and wanton destruction of life and property, extortion of illegal taxes from farmers to access their farms, hunger and looting of food, the rampant kidnapping of innocent people, particularly, abductions of young students for ransom in Nigeria, the failed military coup attempts (in Sierra Leone and Guinea Bissau) and the many successful unconstitutional removal of elected leaders in Gabon, Niger, Chad, Guinea, Burkina Faso, and Mali (twice in 13 months). An analysis of the raging internal and neighbour states wars, disunity amongst leaders, and lack of visionary foresight, one can surmise that the forefathers of African unity and prosperity would be turning in their graves with utter disappointment that their toils for African emancipation had been in vain. 

Prevalence of Insecurity 

Many countries in Africa have suffered and seen dramatic increases in terrorism over the past 15 years with the Sahel region now reported as the epicentre of global terrorism ahead of the Middle East (IEP, 2024).  Sadly, Burkina Faso, Ghana’s close and northern neighbour has become the most impacted country globally by terrorism deaths.

It has experienced 68% increase deaths to 1,907. This figure accounts for a quarter of all global terrorism deaths. Kidnappings and lootings are becoming the norm of daily life in Nigeria, Africa’s largest economy. The inability of the civilian governments to deal with these insecurities and the associated problems are the reasons cited for the spate of military overthrows in the West and Central African regions.

Going beyond these subregions, the toppling of the Libyan (by the West) and the Sudanese governments plunged these countries into protracted civil war leading to malnutrition, hunger, and many deaths, particularly of innocent children, who have been robbed of their future. This is not to mention, the incalculable destruction of vital infrastructure. Similarly, the ongoing insurgencies in Eastern DRC and tensions between DRC and Rwanda; Ethiopia and Somalia are of deep concern for the peaceful development of Africa. The dire consequences of these insecurities can be summed up in a recent cry made by a Sudanese refugee in a South Sudan refugee camp: “We have run from war, but we would be killed here by hunger.” 

Impacts of Insecurity 

Sadly, these situations are exacerbated when African leaders attempt to hold on to power against their constitutional mandates as seen in Gabon, and recently, Equatorial Guinea and Senegal. Indeed, the venerable and distinguished Father of African literature, the 

poet and writer, Chinua Achebe was right in titling his epic book, Things Fall Apart, highlighting the challenges of governance in Africa during colonization. Poor governance in Africa leads to insecurity and unrest, which in turn causes poverty and hunger even though Africa is no longer under direct colonial rule.

Since the 1950s, global statistics reveal that our world has experienced 492 attempted or successful coups. Out of these, Africa has witnessed the most (220) with 109 of these attempts being successful (Duzor & Wiliamson, 2023) . The troubling questions that all concerned thinkers and well-wishers of Africa need to consider are: Why is Africa, particularly, sub-Sahara and West Africa so much prone to unconstitutional coup d’états? And importantly, what should the continental and subregional bodies, specifically the African Union (AU) and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) do to build peace and security on the continent and make military overthrows unthinkable?

Regrettably, records show that an estimated 82 percent of the 149 million Africans facing acute food insecurity are in conflict-affected countries. This underscore the fact that conflict continues to be the primary driver of food crisis in Africa (Africa Centre for Strategic Studies, 2023)  A review by Shemyakina (2022)  strikingly showed how increasing rate of all forms of armed conflicts have risen above strategic development efforts in Africa. 

A study of 45 sub-Saharan countries showed that on average, annual growth in intense conflict countries was about 2.5% points lower, and the that cumulative impact on per capita GDP increases over time (Fang et. al., 2020).  In severe conflict situations, GDP declined by 4.75% in the first year and as much as 6.5% in the subsequent four years. In Sudan, over 25 million people have been displaced, many women raped and increasing number of children are suffering from malnutrition.

Reasons for coups 

The precursors to military coups are complex and difficult to explain. They could be due to a mix of historical, economic, political, military, personal, social, ethnic and cultural reasons (Johnson, Slater & McGowan, 1984).  Therefore, in attempting to answer these complex questions, a rush to condemn all military interventions in Africa must be avoided, as soldiers are also bona fide citizens of their countries, who are interested in the national dignity, territorial integrity, safety, prosperity and effective running of their nations. 

Political scholars have offered several reasons behind unconstitutional military coups in Africa. These include weak governance, deteriorating domestic living conditions, the ever-present historical colonial influence, the large multinational corporations’ interests in the economic and resource sectors of Africa, and the consequent meddling by these state and non-state actors in political governance, coupled with the cancerous political and administrative corruption (Saeed, 2023).  

At CALE, we emphasise the corrosive and destabilising impact of incumbents, who change their national constitutions to entrench themselves in power. Also, the failure of elected governments in dealing with instability, and their ineffective policies that bring hardships, social unrest and upheavals in communities. Finally, we highlight the unjust widening of the wealth gap between the rich and poor. These factors worsen insecurity and threatens national cohesion.

Existing solutions 

Several efforts including 38 African-led peace operations have been authorized and deployed to 25 countries on the continent to address insecurity with global and external Western support (Allen, 2023).   According to the author, some of these deployments have achieved notable successes including rapid deployment to restore constitutional order, doctrinal flexibility and improved coordination in addressing cross border security challenges. However, these Africa-led peace operations have suffered from operational capabilities and lack of 

professionalism, such that the proposed African Standby Force has not become fully operational due to insufficient funds raised for the Africa Peace Fund. There is also poor alignment with civilian-led efforts to manage local conflicts. 

Secondly, in 2003, the AU established the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM) as a voluntary arrangement amongst African states to systematically peer assess and review governance at Head of State level to promote political stability, accelerate sub-regional and continental economic integration, economic growth and sustainable development. Unfortunately, being a voluntary mechanism and therefore unenforceable, the APRM has remained ineffective in modulating leaders’ behaviour and has not achieved its laudable goals. Leaders in many countries across Africa remain largely unaccountable to their populace. The only legitimacy some of these leaders enjoy comes from questionable elections, which are rigged and fraught with unequal playing fields for their challengers. 

According to Sá & Sanches (2021)  powerful “father-like” leaders on the continent such as President Obiang Nguema Mbasogo of Equatorial Guinea uses co-optation (via patronage and cabinet appointments), restrictive institutional rules that protects the regime’s interests and make participation in political opposition difficult. They use selective and diffuse repression that shields their regime and choke off challengers. They project manipulated international linkages for pseudo credibility that offset any pressure for change. Sadly, Africa has the largest number of longest serving leaders with over three decades in power in the world. 

Thirdly, in 2018 the AU launched “Silencing the Gun” strategy, a plan to end all wars, civil conflicts, gender-based violence, violent conflicts and prevent genocide on the continent by 2020. Unfortunately, five years have passed, and instead, the guns continue to blaze even louder in many parts of Africa.

The traditional solutions offered by political scientist and analysts in their attempts to stop coup d’états in Africa focus on achieving economic stability, imposing hardline sanctions as deterrence by regional, continental, and international bodies with the intent to force countries to uphold democratic governance. 

Although, these punitive sanctions have been rolled out time after time, they have failed to stop unconstitutional overthrows in Africa. This is because these bodies fail to understand and address the underlying factors that precipitate these coup d’états. Principally, these are poor governance, underdevelopment, structural weaknesses, poverty, inequalities, endemic corruption, and lack of adequate resources for building strong territorial armies. The recent string of military coups in Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso are cases in point. 

Following the Western playbook, ECOWAS was quick to impose sanctions even though it had failed to provide these member states any tangible support in their well-known struggles against terrorism and insurgencies. Likewise, the ECOWAS leaders knew the governance problems in these member states and no serious attempts were made to resolve them.

Like the AU, ECOWAS lacks tangible political integration necessary to actualise its aims of “promoting co-operation and integration, leading to the establishment of an economic union in West Africa in order to raise the living standards of its peoples, and to maintain and enhance economic stability, foster relations-among Member States and contribute to the progress and development of the African continent” (ECOWAS Revised Treaty, 1993). It is regrettable that instead of “fostering relationships” some leaders act in ways that undermine the same, and are tantamount to betraying fellow member states. 

Also, ECOWAS leaders have shown inconsistencies in how they handled these cascading coups in the three member states. They failed to take decisive actions against Mali and Burkina Faso but threatened Niger with military intervention to restore the ousted civilian government that never materialised. They took different negotiating approaches, closed borders, imposed economic sanctions and suspended the countries from the bloc. These actions hurt the ordinary citizens, who popularly supported the regime changes. However, instead of capitulating, the military leaders defiantly, agreed to exit the bloc and formed their own alliance. This turn of affairs has caused turmoil in the subregion and forced ECOWAS to retract the imposed sanctions on the pretext of 

humanitarian reasons and called for reopening of dialogue. This embarrassing loss of credibility could have been avoided, if serious political integration, joint military force, accountability, and implementation of mandatory peer reviewed governance mechanisms that pursue early interventions had been developed.

New Solutions 
The question of effective and accountable leadership, and governance systems need to be seriously addressed to provide hope and better living conditions for the citizens of Africa. We must educate and provide opportunities to prevent West African youths from falling into religious radicalisation, the looting caused by hardships, banditry and insurgencies being witnessed in the region. 

At CALE, we strongly believe that peace and security are fundamental for Africa’s developmental efforts. Therefore, we must address the underlying chronic poor leadership, governance and structural weaknesses, which are the critical root causes of the continent’s slow development. It must also be emphasised that national security is the bedrock of national development. Therefore, developing national consciousness and civic pride are the most effective ways to build grassroot civil defence against destabilising elements in local communities.

Secondly, the reasons for Africa’s inability, particularly, in the West and Central subregions to arrest these insecurity challenges are largely due to poverty, lack of development and poorly resourced armies in the fragmented nation states. Africa, beginning with the eight subregional economic communities need to move swiftly towards political and military integration. It must return to Dr. Kwame Nkrumah’s vision for a United State of Africa. Africa needs to implement effective and binding conflict resolution mechanisms and a mandatory APRM in place of the voluntary mechanism.

Thirdly, Pan-African political integration, and formation of a joint high command force would resolve the high military cost and difficulties involved in tackling the continuing local and cross border insurgencies and terrorist activities. These would allow unity of purpose and the pulling of resources together to effectively fight off the growing insecurity threats. Importantly, political integration would also deter unconstitutional coup d’états as a “collective defence” operational mechanism, like that of the NATO Alliance, namely – “attack on one is an attack on all” can be realised. This means an attack or insurrection in one country would trigger a military response from the joint high command forces leaving the “uprisers” no place to hide. Interestingly, a similar collective force called Anti Insurgency Force has been established by the breakaway Alliance of Sahel States to fight insurgencies and defend their territorial integrity.

Fourth, to survive and be relevant to the lives of citizens, ECOWAS, and the AU need bold leadership to drive further reforms and move member states towards political integration like the EU model. Looking at the turbulent political history of West Africa and Africa as a whole, particularly considering the current geopolitical dynamics the prophetic message of Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah for a United States of Africa remains an urgent necessity, if Africa is going to see lasting peace and wholesale durable development of greater benefit to the people. 

West Africa and the whole of Africa need a uniform vision and common voice on global platforms to be taken seriously, as a respected global player. It is interesting to note that the rest of the world refers and treat Africa as one country, but African leaders continue to cling to their colonially demarcated artificial ‘little’ enclaves in the name of national sovereignty, forgetting that our relevance lies in our collective unity as one people. 

Fifth, a bold political union of Africa coupled with its strong and healthy relationship with China could radically change the global order. Together, they can push for a fairer and more balanced geopolitical architecture that would allow equitable and sustainable development of all human societies. 

As outlined in Nkrumah’s manifesto for Africa, the AU Assembly in the collective interest and welfare of African people, should agree to put in motion a mechanism at the foreign minister’s level to harmonise the political systems and work out the modalities to actualise the needed politically united superstate of Africa. The Agenda 2063 vision should become the developmental blueprint for the envisaged African superstate. 

In this direction, China’s political model offers a good example for the African superstate. Each African state could be the equivalent of the Chinese provincial and administrative regions as they represent different ethnic groupings in the country and each has a functioning local government. The central government retains foreign policy, overall strategic development, and have national security powers. We should be working towards removing all restrictions on free movements on the continent by developing common African passport. Certain countries, e.g. Kenya are already implementing this one Africa goal.

As part of this United Africa process, the Assembly should consider making the APRM mandatory for all member states. It should elect or appoint an APRM Body consisting of respected ex-African leaders, eminent scholars and practitioners from various disciplines, exemplary civil servants versed in public administration and successful entrepreneurs from member states to conduct country evaluation and audits on all the agreed developmental key indicators in the Agenda 2063 vision, as a baseline for planning. 

The work of the APRM Body should be supportive and forward looking in its approach. It should devise working framework and protocols, which should be approved by the AU Assembly. Its primary goal should be to find out effective policies, mechanisms and programmes that have produced tangible transformative progress in the different countries, which can be shared and scaled up across the continent. The APRM should work with “national” (the to be provinces) officials to devise technical support mechanisms to help each state improve and overcome identified challenges. Where necessary, a number of the existing states should be merged for greater administrative efficiency.

Conclusion 

In the face of the many crises caused in part by the foreign-imposed divisive border and governance system that tear Africans apart, the continuing terror of terrorism, the wanton destruction of civil wars, the vice of poverty and hunger that follows these evils, the wasteful expenditure on internal border policing that restrict trading amongst ourselves and the shameless colonial and foreign exploitation, Africa is at a crossroad that radical decisions have to be taken - change course or continue business as usual?

We evoke the memories of our Pan-Africanist forefathers, freedom fighters and thinkers, in particular, President Julius Nyerere of Tanzania and Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, the founding father of Ghana. The later, a tireless champion of the elusive Union of African States, in his speech at the founding of the OAU, in Addis Ababa, on 24 May 1963 said: “It is clear that we must find an African solution to our problems, and that this can only be found in African unity. Divided we are weak; united Africa could become one of the greatest forces for good in the world. We must unite now or perish.” 

Finally, we humbly ask all current African leaders, in particular, ECOWAS and the African Union Commission, your Excellencies, which way forward please? We, the children of Africa deserve your unequivocal answer. Thank you.

The writer is the Founder and Executive Director of Centre for African Leadership & Excellence (CALE)