Opinion
Contrary to what radicals of all stripes maintain, the Economic Community of West African States and the Alliance of Sahel States have a linked destiny. The two organizations need each other. Their peaceful and intelligent coexistence could serve regional security and stability as well as integration, says journalist and academic specializing in the Sahel Seidik Abba.
By Seidik Abba
THE Sahel has not only lost the stability and peace of which it was once a true haven. It has also lost the possibility of debating in all serenity and with nuance the geopolitical and geostrategic configurations that are deployed there. Now, only those who defend the Alliance of Sahel States (ESA) and are against the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), or those who support the latter and are against the former, have a public presence.
Crossed needs
The Manichean posture thus declined corresponds neither to the reality on the ground nor to the pragmatism essential in the conduct of public affairs. Taken in isolation, each of the three ESA countries inevitably needs its partners who have remained in ECOWAS. In addition to family entanglements, Niger shares nearly 1,500 km of border with Nigeria; five of the country’s eight administrative regions border Nigeria (with the exception of Agadez, Niamey and Tillabéry). Nigeria remains Niger’s leading economic partner. The same picture could be drawn for the close relations between Mali and its Ivorian and Senegalese neighbors.
Around 90% of Mali’s imports/exports pass through the ports of Abidjan and Dakar. Côte d’Ivoire hosts the largest Malian diaspora in the world (around 4 million people). Finally, Burkina Faso’s relations are also stronger with its neighbors that have remained in ECOWAS than with its two AES partners. As a hinterland country, Burkina Faso must import or export via Côte d’Ivoire, Benin, Ghana or Togo. Between five and six million Burkinabe live on Ivorian soil. Behind the great speeches of rupture, there are realities that are stronger than postures and links that have become irreversible.
Security challenge
And yet, it is above all in the face of the security challenge that the 12 States remaining in ECOWAS and the three parties to create, in September 2023, the AES – which became, in July 2024 in Niamey, the AES Confederation – have an inseparable destiny. Even if we give credit to ECOWAS’s new commitment to now assume leadership in the fight against terrorism in West Africa, we do not see how it could achieve this without the AES States, the epicentre of the threat in the sub-region. No need to be an expert to be sure that it will be impossible to fight against jihadist groups in Benin, Côte d’Ivoire and Togo (Gulf of Guinea States) without involving Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger.
The same arguments can be used to show the limits of the AES’s anti-terrorism strategy, if it did not involve the Gulf of Guinea countries. The AES must be credited with having pushed to an unprecedented level in the sub-region the desire to build a common security response to the jihadist threat, well beyond what the G5 Sahel was. For the first time, the armies of Niger, Burkina Faso and Mali organized, in May 2024 in Tahoua, in the northwest of Niger, very large-scale military maneuvers, in which Chad and Togo took part as invited countries.
Recently, the three AES countries have been exchanging liaison officers in order to better coordinate joint operations against terrorist groups. The three countries have also made notable progress in sharing intelligence and pooling air attack and transport resources (drones, helicopters, troop transport planes). But all this will not be enough to reverse the balance of power with the jihadist groups, if the AES does not work with ECOWAS to build a regional response, associating the Sahel and the Gulf of Guinea in the face of the security challenge that has clearly become sub-regional.
Togolese wisdom
Far from the entrenched and maximalist positions, there are, fortunately, supporters of a peaceful relationship, or even a partnership, between ECOWAS and the AES. Togo had chosen this path from the beginning of the crisis between ECOWAS and the Sahelian countries that have experienced military coups. After Macky Sall left power and Diomaye Faye arrived, Senegal came to reinforce the camp of the supporters***Seidik Abba, journalist, writer and academic, president of the International Center for Reflections and Studies on the Sahel (Cires, a think tank based in Paris).
A.I
Oct. 25, 2024
Tags: Diomaye Faye ECOWAS Macky Sall Seidik Abba.
