In cooperation with the West Africa Democracy Solidarity Network (WADEMOS), Antonia Witt, Amado Kaboré, Sait Matty Jaw and Sophia Birchinger from the Research Group African Intervention Politics organized a hybrid webinar entitled “Closing the gap: Citizens' perspectives on ECOWAS interventions and implications for the future” on March 4.
The vision of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) is to become an “ECOWAS of the people”. But what do citizens in the region think about ECOWAS and what do they expect from it? Research results from the DFG-funded project “Local Perceptions of Regional Interventions: AU and ECOWAS in Burkina Faso and The Gambia” suggest that West African citizens are largely unaware of the role and objectives of ECOWAS. Not least since Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger left the regional bloc in response to the organization's handling of the coups in the three countries, the question of how ECOWAS can reconnect with its citizens is one of the biggest challenges for the future of regional integration in West Africa.
The webinar took place as a public part of the annual WADEMOS network meeting and aimed to make available the research results from the DFG-funded project led by Antonia Witt to a broader civil society audience, to discuss the results in the current context with civil society actors and to discuss the implications of these results for a constructive approach to the growing divide between ECOWAS and the citizens of the region. A total of almost 100 participants attended the webinar, among them civil society representatives from Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Côte d'Ivoire, The Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Togo, and representatives from German ministries, development cooperation organizations, and political foundations.
The webinar was moderated by Paul Osei-Kuffour (WADEMOS Network Coordinator). After an introduction of the project by Antonia Witt and the presentation of the research findings by Sait Matty Jaw (PRIF Associate and Executive Director of the Center for Research and Policy Development, CPRD, The Gambia), a panel discussion followed with Habibu Yaya Bappah (Executive Assistant to the President of the ECOWAS Commission, ECOWAS Commission, Nigeria), Anyway Chingwete (Deputy Director of Survey, Afrobarometer, Ghana), Professor David Dosseh (Coordinator Front Togo Debout and Tournons La Page, Togo) and project members Amado Kaboré (l'Institut des Sciences des Societés, INSS, Burkina Faso) and Sophia Birchinger (PRIF). In response, the various network members contributed and discussed the research findings and the resulting policy recommendations in the light of current developments in the ECOWAS region and reports from the various ECOWAS member states.
The webinar is part of a series of transfer activities of the DFG project. In addition to transfer activities in Burkina Faso and The Gambia, a delegation recently traveled to the ECOWAS Commission in Abuja, Nigeria, to present and discuss the research results there as well. Simultaneous French-Portuguese-English translation was available to participants of the webinar.