Foreign
THE ECOWAS Regional Competition Authority, ERCA, and the ECOWAS Commission’s Directorate of Trade organised a training programme on competition policy for stakeholders from Member States with the technical and financial support of Expertise France.
The training session, which was held in Accra, Ghana from 20 to 23 September 2022, was to urgently provide ECOWAS Member States’ negotiators with basic knowledge of competition policy and law.
The meeting, according to the statement by the ECOWAS Commission, highlighted the implications of adopting a competition policy at the continental level in relation to national and regional competition rules and outlined a common ECOWAS position within the framework of the AfCFTA negotiations on competition.
It added that Simeon Koffi, Executive Director of the ERCA, acknowledged during opening ceremony of the training, on behalf of the President of the ECOWAS Commission, the presence of all the expected national stakeholders and their commitment to the ongoing negotiations at the continental level.
He noted the positive dynamics of developing a competitive framework at national, regional and continental levels, with the harmonisation and adoption of rules in line with the best international standards, a development that the capacity building of stakeholders would consolidate.
Augustine Owusu, the representative of Expertise France, expressed his satisfaction with the cooperation between the ECOWAS Commission and his organisation within the framework of the training session and hoped that this cooperation will be strengthened and expressed the availability of Expertise France to accompany ECOWAS in promoting a competitive environment and regional integration.
In his opening remarks, Osvaldo Abibe, Chairman of the ECOWAS Trade Experts Meeting, recalled the issues to be discussed during the meeting and stated that the various stages of negotiations on competition reflect the need to equip the stakeholders concerned with useful knowledge to better understand the aspects and implications of competition laws at the continental level.
He urged the participants to leverage the knowledge acquired during the training session.
According to the statement, the issues addressed during the training session included the benefits of competition policy for a national economy; the fight against cartels and all horizontal and vertical agreements harmful to competition; the concept of the market; merger control, especially mergers; procedural fairness and transparency; competitive assessment of laws and regulations; the concept of competitive neutrality; market power and abuse of dominant position; state aid; the AfCFTA protocol on competition and its implications for ECOWAS and its member states.
The participants thanked the two facilitators of the training, Ms Lynn Robertson of the OECD Competition Division and Mr Sami Ouattara, Regional Competition Consultant, while the States Parties, negotiators of the AfCFTA protocol, were called upon to take ownership of the regional consensus on the protocol and to make the voice of ECOWAS heard in continental negotiations.
A.I
Tags: AfCFTA ECOWAS Mr Sami Ouattara Ms Lynn Robertson Osvaldo Abibe Simeon Koffi
