- According to President Addo-Addo, President Bassirou Diomaye Diakhar Faye, who was just sworn in as president of Senegal, will use his goodwill both inside Senegal and among the members of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to help resolve the issue of Niger, Burkina Faso, and Mali’s withdrawal from the regional bloc.
- In January 2024, Niger, Mali, and Burkina Faso declared their intention to exit the ECOWAS. The union has been pressuring the junta-led nations to revert to democratic governance, and they had already been suspended from membership. The three countries declared that the decision to leave Ecowas was a “sovereign decision.”
- The bloc was first formed in 1975, and the three nations are founding members of it. ECOWAS had “strayed from the ideals of its founding fathers and the spirit of Pan-Africanism,” according to a joint statement that was read aloud to official stations in the three nations.
- Following military coups in Niger in July, Burkina Faso in 2022, and Mali in 2020, ties between the ECOWAS bloc and the three nations—Niger, Mali, and Burkina Faso—have been severe. All three of these countries have been urged by ECOWAS to revert to civilian government in their respective countries.
- President Bassirou Diomaye Diakhar Faye’s official one-day state visit to Ghana concluded with bilateral talks at the Jubilee House on Friday, May 17, 2024. President Akufo-Addo addressed the media after the talks and said President Faye had shown commitment to ECOWAS’s efforts to get the three countries back to the bloc and back to the negotiating table.
