Odimmegwa Johnpeter/Abuja
The parliament of the Economic Community of West African States has expressed support for sanction on any member state that refused to fully support trade protocols to boost regional integration, ease the movement of people, goods and services, and support small and medium-sized enterprises across the sub-region.
Recall that Dr. Tony Luka Elumelu of the ECOWAS Business Council Secretariat in the commission had earlier recommended the sanctions while giving a presentation on Monday.
Speaking in an interview on Tuesday at the sidelines of the delocalized meeting of the ECOWAS Parliament’s Joint Committee on Industry and Private Sector, Macroeconomic Policy and Economic Research, Administration, Finance and Budget, Public Accounts in Cotonou, Republic of Benin, Hon. Bashiru Dawodu said it is high time countries in the region stopped acting in silos.
He said, ‘ I buy into this idea because look at, they say we are about 400 million people in the west of maritime generating billions of dollars but our challenge is that we are not integrated’.
‘We are all in silos so and we have the laws and sometimes you know it’s not a la carte. People have to be pressured to do the right thing’.
‘If the countries know that they have the sanctions, I think they would do better.’
Speaking further, the Nigerian lawmaker insisted that the free movement of people, goods and services within the sub-region remains a very important requirement for the progress of businesses in ECOWAS.
He also advocated the advancement of businesses in the region to operate in the formal sector, stressing that many MSMEs remain excluded from formal trade and financing opportunities.
According to him, integrating these businesses into regional value chains would improve access to funding, strengthen infrastructure and expand cross-border trade.
He said’ it’s extremely important to integrate the small and medium businesses into the value chain. As you are aware, in ECOWAS countries, most of our people are into small and medium-scale businesses. We think about 90% of the folks are in the informal sector.
So, you find that most of our folks that are trading are not integrated into the formal sector. So, it’s difficult to capture that. So, the whole essence of this particular meeting is to strengthen the involvement so there’s better integration of goods and services as well as giving adequate financing to small-scale businesses and improving the infrastructure’.
Also speaking, Hon. Taa Wongbe urged ECOWAS parliamentarians and member state governments to enforce existing agreements, remove unnecessary barriers to trade and improve regional cooperation.
The Liberian lawmaker opined that sustained pressure and stronger political commitment would make the vision of a truly integrated West Africa a reality.
He said, ‘Unfortunately after all of these years we are still experiencing the same challenges. I shared my experience as a young child moving from Nimba from Liberia through these borders coming right here in Benin and even buying goods at the Grand March market. During those periods we spend sometimes weeks, days on the road and now our mothers are still experiencing the same thing.
He wants the parliament to form a committee that will go to the borders on a sight-seeing visit in order to know how serious this issue is and the best way to tackle it.
‘So one of the things I’ve been pushing even last year I pushed this so that we can be able to form a committee to experience the same thing the people are experiencing. When we experience it then we can go and pressure our governments to be able to remove some of those roadblocks on the road. We’re experiencing these things. I go to Sierra Leone the same thing you go from Liberia to Ghana on the road the same thing and that puts goods and services to be very expensive in these different countries. So that is my push again, let’s work with our government to push this thing over and over’.
Going by the submissions from the commission and the parliament of the sub-region, the ball is now in the court of leaders of member states to decide if they really envisaged an ECOWAS where businesses especially MSMEs will thrive thereby tackling poverty and unemployment as well as addressing insecurity.
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