EAC integration loses tempo

Members of the East African Legislative Assembly in a session

PHOTO | FILE

What you need to know:

  • Ecowas is the most experienced and adventurous of the eight regional economic communities recognised by the African Union when it comes to taming some of the most destructive “demons” in post-colonial state building projects like waging war to keep peace and removing presidents who overstay their welcome with the recent example being that of former Ivory Coast’s president Laurent Gbagbo where it supported UN-led efforts to kick him out of office.

As news of the Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas) piled pressure on defeated Gambian leader Yahya Jammeh who accepted electoral loss , but then changed his mind, and a new president being sworn in, East Africans are either depressed or indifferent as signs point to a bleak future as enthusiasm among member states to move the region towards higher levels of integration seems to be waning.

Ecowas is the most experienced and adventurous of the eight regional economic communities recognised by the African Union when it comes to taming some of the most destructive “demons” in post-colonial state building projects like waging war to keep peace and removing presidents who overstay their welcome with the recent example being that of former Ivory Coast’s president Laurent Gbagbo where it supported UN-led efforts to kick him out of office.

The strangest thing is that today one can understand Ecowas’ push to drive Jammeh out of power as; among other reasons being a result of some of those who hold political clout in that region have experience on the side of the political fence with one of them put into office after bloody battles but even in the past, when democracy and term limits were not so much talk of the town, very unlikely characters like Nigeria’s Sani Abacha helped restore sanity in some of the worst civil wars on the continent.

The EAC is the oldest of the eight regional economic communities; one would expect an organisation that rose and collapsed and came back from the dead to have seen it all, learned it all and was ready to lead by example. Of course the situation is not as bad as is the case with the Arab Maghreb Union which is like the dormant volcanoes of mount Kilimanjaro as it has not held any meetings for nearly a decade now, and has not reached the point where the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS) which was also inactive for years.

Even EAC sceptics would appreciate the role it plays however limited it is because after its collapse in 1977, its former member states went to war, diplomatic relations were severed, and countries accused each other of supporting coup plotters. We have come from far but that does not mean that we are in a place where the region can say it can catch its breath.

What could explain the current inertia?

The EAC is its own worst enemy. Consider how its member states dealt with the issue of Economic Partnership Agreement.

Even though it was supposed to be a joint effort on the part of the EAC countries they were split from the outset. Burundi being on the EU sanctions wasn’t even invited on the table, and this is where EAC countries got it wrong. They were negotiating with the EU as a bloc not as individual countries, which means Burundi should have been part of the EAC negotiations.

The EU nearly abandoned its trade deal with Canada after resistance from a region in Belgium. But here EAC countries were divided from the beginning and left Burundi under the bus and negotiated individually, each to get the best deal for them. Under such circumstances the regional agenda takes a back seat.

The continued deterioration of relations between Burundi and Rwanda, where the former accuses the later of supporting, training and arming elements hell-bent on deposing Burundi’s Pierre Nkurunziza.

Despite Burundi and Rwanda being no centres of gravity in the EAC, their strained relations have a negative impact on the EAC to act as one. Unlike Ecowas, where in some of those countries the dominant political parties have long been dislodged from power, the EAC is a mix of long ruling parties/movements and vested interests with no appetite for interventions claiming to adhere to the Westphalian notions of sovereignty and legal equality of states-both of which are a myth. After all joining any international organisation means a state cedes a certain extent of its authority.

EAC member states are too tied down with their own domestic priorities to the point where old rivalries and suspicions which sent the first EAC to its early grave in 1977 continue to persist and the addition of new members like South Sudan which itself is a fragmented state with little time for the regional organisation it joined has done little to ease these tensions, which manifested in such ways like the Coalition of the Willing.

Are we headed for another obituary? That does not seem to be the case at the moment but what is for sure is that there is little appetite for the regional project, and we need more than hashtags to get things moving again but that would nonetheless be a good start.