New ECOWAS Chief Says Bloc Will Keep Reaching Out to AES States

Birame Diop took office as ECOWAS Commission president with a direct message about the bloc’s deepest fracture: Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger may have left, but geography has not changed.

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We have no other choice, because our brothers, our neighbours, our comrades have left us, but geography remains the same.

At his handover ceremony in Abuja, Diop said ECOWAS needed to rebuild its unity and reopen meaningful engagement with the three Sahel countries. Their departure followed years of disputes over military rule, sanctions and the regional bloc’s approach to constitutional order.

The new president pointed to roughly 5,250 kilometres of shared borders between ECOWAS and the Alliance of Sahel States, or AES. Millions of people continue to cross those borders, trade and interact, he said. Terrorism, organized transnational crime, irregular migration and environmental problems also extend beyond the political lines separating the two groupings.

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So, we have no other choice than to work in a solidary, concerted manner for the interest of both spaces.

“We have no other choice, because our brothers, our neighbours, our comrades have left us, but geography remains the same,” Diop said. He later called for the two sides to work together “in a solidary, concerted manner for the interest of both spaces”.

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At a crossroads

Diop also described ECOWAS as being “at a crossroads”. He urged member states and the commission to overcome internal differences and restore confidence in regional integration. Nigeria supported the approach. Speaking for President Bola Tinubu, Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Sola Enikanolaiye described Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger as “our brothers and sisters in our shared region and with common challenges and aspirations”.

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Our brothers and sisters in our shared region and with common challenges and aspirations.