It also urged Ghana’s President to lead the way in bringing back the three countries - Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger - that have threatened to leave the bloc.

“It is important for us to see how best you can lead our efforts from the counter-terrorism angle to bring these three back to ECOWAS. They are the main epicentres of the terrorism and really the region cannot fight terrorism without them,” it added.

The President of the ECOWAS Commission, Dr Omar Alieu Touray, made the call when he led a three-man delegation from the Commission to brief President Akufo-Addo on the current development in the region and also seek his leadership in resolving issues about membership and terrorism.

Guidance

The delegation was also at the Presidency to seek the President’s guidance and leadership in reactivating the mission on counter-terrorism and brief him about the development that had taken place under his direction.

Dr Touray used the occasion to introduce the newly appointed ECOWAS Special Envoy on Counter Terrorism, Baba Kamara, a former Ghanaian Minister of National Security, to President Akufo-Addo.

Other members of the delegation were the ECOWAS Commissioner for Political Affairs, Peace and Security, Dr Abdel-Fatau Musah, and the ECOWAS Resident Representative to Ghana, Baba Gana Wakil.

In 2021, the heads of state and government of ECOWAS made President Akufo-Addo the Champion on matters relating to counter-terrorism in the sub-region. Dr Touray said the commission had convened a meeting of Chiefs of Defence Staff and Ministers of Defence and Security to activate the ECOWAS standby force and review ECOWAS’ Plan of Action, which were at the instance of President Akufo-Addo.

He added that recommendations from these exercises included the establishment of a standby force of 5,000, which would cost about $2.4 billion, while the other proposal was a brigade of 1,500 men, which would cost about $1 billion.

Funding

“Your instruction also asked us to see how best we can fund our own peace support operations and that in between, a lot has happened, including a UN Resolution, which would allow the UN to finance 75 per cent of ECOWAS peace support operations,” Dr Touray added.

Dr Touray commended Ghana’s leading role in pushing to secure the UN support, saying, “we believe your mission would include leading us to find ways to raise the remaining 25 per cent.”

This is where we seek your leadership,”he added.

3 Countries

He said the guidance of President Akufo-Addo was also crucial in the discussions to bring back those three countries that had threatened to opt out of the regional body and stressed the need for ECOWAS to continue with the engagement.

“This was necessary because the threat to exit from ECOWAS threatened the security and governance in various countries in the region because in future anybody could rise up and do something unconstitutional and get support from these countries,” he stated.

Reforms

Dr Touray announced that the commission was planning to hold a special summit that would bring all stakeholders on board, including countries in transition, to look at issues regarding the future of regional integration, security in the region and governance.

He was of the strong conviction that the outcome could help reform ECOWAS and would cover the entire community and all its institutions, protocols and texts in the light of current geo-politics and check if there was room for adjustment.

He said the review was necessary because when those protocols, texts and the community were being put together the context was different; hence, the need for a second look.

Strategy

President Akufo-Addo called for a meeting of member states to agree on the various strategies to deal with the various issues and come to a consensus on the way forward. “But nevertheless, this cannot be a Ghanaian initiative.

It has to be an ECOWAS-wide initiative, and I feel that for us to have real clarity going forward, there must be an agreement amongst the heads of state as to our strategy going forward,” President Akufo-Addo remarked.

“It is on that basis that we can flesh out the other matters that you have talked about,” President Akufo-Addo added.