The news was like a bolt from the blue in the sub-region. Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso simultaneously announced, on Sunday January 28, their departure with immediate effect from the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), an organization whose role is to promote cooperation, created in 1975 and bringing together fifteen member states until then.

“After 49 years of existence, the valiant people of Burkina, Mali and Niger note with great regret, bitterness and great disappointment that their Organization has moved away from the ideals of its founding fathers and from Pan-Africanism” the three states said in a joint statement dated January 28.  

This historic rupture is the epilogue of a long standoff between ECOWAS and the military who came to power during a series of coups d'état, in Mali, Burkina Faso and then Niger. Explanations.

The election dispute

On August 18, 2020, Malian President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta was overthrown by the army, in a context of social unrest. Mali's international partners, including France, the United States and Algeria, condemn the putsch. On the front line, ECOWAS published a scathing press release in which it “categorically denies any form of legitimacy to the putschists and demands the immediate restoration of constitutional order”.

Initially founded to promote economic cooperation between its member states, the subregional organization subsequently adopted political principles. “Any unconstitutional change is prohibited, as is any non-democratic mode of accession or maintenance to power” we can read in its protocol on democracy and good governance of December 21, 2001.

Based on these principles, it imposed an economic embargo against Mali twice, between August 2020 and July 2022. Heavy sanctions, denounced as “inhumane, illegitimate and illegal” by the transitional authorities; who claim that they contravene the fundamental freedoms of the population.

For its part, ECOWAS is calling for clear commitments regarding the holding of elections "within a reasonable time", the only way, according to it, to ensure that the military does not stay in power forever.

Irreconcilable visions

Like Mali, Burkina Faso is the scene of a double putsch, in January then in September 2022. In Niger, President Mohamed Bazoum, close ally of France and fervent detractor of military coups, is in turn overthrown by the army on July 26, 2023.

Once again, ECOWAS imposes heavy sanctions – particularly on Niger, which remains under an economic embargo to this day. But as with Bamako, the negotiations proved laborious and the divide grew.

Guinea-Bissau President Umaro Sissoco Embaló, who takes over the rotating presidency of the organization in July 2022, is calling for the establishment within ECOWAS of an “anti-putsch force”. In the 21st century, the coup d'état cannot be "a 'fast track' to reach the top of the state", he denounces. His successor, the newly elected Nigerian president Bola Tinubu, threatens to send a regional military force to dislodge the putschist soldiers from Niger and restore President Bazoum to power.

Opposite, the putschist soldiers denounce the "double standards" of an organization quick to denounce coups d'état, but which they accuse of being much more conciliatory in the face of the democratic abuses of elected presidents. Abdoulaye Maïga, the Malian interim Prime Minister, notably described the re-election to a third term of Ivorian President Alassane Ouattara in 2020 as an "electoral farce", made possible by the adoption of a new constitution.

New balance of power

The leaders of Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger, who justify their coming to power by the seriousness of the terrorist threat, also criticize ECOWAS for its lack of support in the security field. Once confined to the north of Mali, insecurity has increased considerably in recent years in the so-called three borders region (Mali, Burkina, Niger), prey to attacks by armed groups linked to Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group.

“The problem is to see African heads of state who bring nothing to these people who are fighting, but who sing the same thing as the imperialists by calling us militias” denounced the president of the Burkinabe transition, Ibrahim Traoré , during a highly regarded speech during the Russia-Africa Summit in St. Petersburg last July.

Finally, this divorce with ECOWAS is part of a reconfiguration of international and regional alliances initiated by the military coup leaders of the three countries. Following the example of Mali, Burkina and Niger severed their ties with France and began a rapprochement with Russia. Last September, the three states concluded a mutual defense pact, the Alliance of Sahel States (AES). An agreement aimed at strengthening their collaboration in the fight against terrorist groups, but also to protect against possible interventions by armed forces, such as that envisaged by ECOWAS in Niger.

By announcing their departure from ECOWAS, the three countries “castigated an organization under the influence of foreign powers” ​​which had become “a threat to its member states”.

Reacting to the declaration of Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger, ECOWAS defended its “assistive work with the countries concerned with a view to restoring constitutional order” and reaffirmed its determination to “find a negotiated solution to the political impasse ".

She also indicated that she had not received formal notification of withdrawal. Although announced as "immediate", this should take a year, according to the organization's texts.

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