The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) has intensified its sanctions against Mali for the refusal of the transitional government to return the trouble-riddled nation to constitutional rule.
The decision was taken at an extraordinary session of the Heads of State and Government of ECOWAS in Accra yesterday under the chairmanship of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.
The ECOWAS member states have agreed to withdraw their diplomatic envoys in Mali as part of the sanctions against the transitional government in Mali.
They have also agreed to close all their land and air borders to the Sahelean nation, and have tightened the economic and financial sanctions against Mali.
The Heads of States took the decision after reviewing a decision by the transitional government to return the country to constitutional rule after four years.
The transition authorities in Mali, in a letter submitted to President Akufo-Addo, ECOWAS Chair, on January 7, said they would need four years to return the country to constitutional rule.
Meanwhile, ECOWAS had given the Malian authorities a deadline of February 27, to hold elections and return Mali to constitutional rule.
Mali’s transitional authorities had initially recommended that the country’s transition period should run for a period of five years but modified that decision and opted for a four-year transitional period.
President Akufo-Addo, at the ECOWAS meeting yesterday, put the proposal from the transitional authorities before the Heads of State of ECOWAS for consideration and action.
But the Heads of States, after deliberating on the proposal of the transitional government in Mali, agreed to suspend all economic and financial ties with Mali.
Present at the ECOWAS meeting were the President of Benin, Patrice Talon, President of Burkina Faso, Roch Marc Christian Kabore, President of Cote d’Ivoire, Alassane Ouattara, and President of Guinea Bissau, Umaro Sissoco Embalo.
Others were President of Liberia, George Manneh Weah, President of Niger, Mohamed Bazoum, President of Sierra Leone, Julius Maada Bio, President of Senegal, Macky Sall, and Vice President of The Gambia, Dr Isatou Touray.
The rest are the Vice President of Nigeria, Yemi Osibanjo, Roberty Dussey, Minister of Foreign Affairs, African Integration and Togolese Abroad, Togo, Dr Goodluck Jonathan, former President of Nigeria and ECOWAS Mediator for Mali, Jean-Claude Kassi Brou, President of ECOWAS Commission, among others.
The ECOWAS leaders have agreed to suspend all commercial and financial transactions between ECOWAS Member States and Mali, with the exception of pharmaceutical products; medical supplies and equipment, including materials for the control of COVID-19; petroleum products and electricity.
ECOWAS has also frozen the assets of the Republic of Mali in ECOWAS Central Banks, frozen the assets of the Malian State and the State Enterprises and Parastatals in Commercial Banks, and suspended Mali from all financial assistance and transactions from all financial institutions in the region.
In addition, the ECOWAS Authority has instructed all community institutions to take steps to implement the sanctions which will be implemented with immediate effect.
The sanctions will be gradually lifted only after an acceptable and agreed chronogram is finalised and monitored, satisfactory progress is realised in the implementation of the chronogram for the elections, the Authority agreed.
According to ECOWAS, the sanctions have been put in place to facilitate the process of a return to constitutional order in Mali to ensure the peace, stability and growth of the country.
