ECOWAS: a promise of hope or success for sub-regional economic integration in West Africa
ECOWAS: a promise of hope or success for sub-regional economic integration in West Africa

Summary/Abstract: The Economic Community of West African State (ECOWAS) with its French acronym CEDEAO is one of the oldest post colonial sub-regional economic organisations in the African Continent. An organisation established with the original aim of building a strong economic bloc within the West African sub-region but close to four decades after its inception, it is still staggering to meet the aims and objectives of the founding fathers even though the treaty establishing it has been revised, with additional protocols to create new organs and initiatives that will make the organisation more functional in line with the 21st century needs of the nationals of its contracting state parties similar to those of the European Union (EU) and other successful regional economic blocs. This paper therefore will consider the provisions of the ECOWAS treaty as embedded in Article 3 dealing with the aims and objectives of the Community as an organisation for sub-regional economic integration, addressing the reality of its operation and asking whether based on its current status, there is any real hope of regional integration giving the ups and down of its performance in the scale of regional economic communities in Africa and the world.

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