•Says Nigeria must stand up to leadership role in Africa
Emma Emeozor: [email protected]
African leaders made a landmark decision when they converged on Kigali, the Rwandan capital, on March 21, to affirm their resolve and commitment to the establishment of the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AFCFTA), the first of its kind since the African Union (AU) and its parent body, the Organisation of African Unity, was founded in 1963.
Chairperson of the AU Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat, aptly referred to the tortuous road that culminated in the Kigali pact when he said: “After Addis Ababa in May 1963, Abuja in June 1991 and Durban in July 2002, Kigali, in this month of March, marks a new step in our march towards greater integration and closer unity.”
Host President, Paul Kagame, in his opening address, was frank enough to have paid tribute to past leaders of the continent for planting the seed that would later germinate to become AFCFTA. He said: “I wish to acknowledge all the leaders, past and present, involved in bringing us to this point. We are reaping the rewards of their foresight.
But beyond the echo of inspiration from Kigali, has the AU the will power to translate AFCFTA from paperwork to reality, can it be said that Africa’s economic integration has started in earnest? Put differently, what hope is there in the Kigali summit or is it another jamboree for African leaders? Diplomatic Circuit spoke with Ghana’s New Patriotic Party chairman of the Nigeria branch and senior partner, Chambers of Ganzallo Law Firm, Kofi Atiemo-Gyan, in his Ikeja, Lagos, office on the prospects of AFCFTA.
Gyan was quick to describe AFCFTA as a laudable project. He believes that the free trade area, if properly implemented, could bring the much-needed economic transformation that will change the face of Africa.
But Gyan’s optimism was restrained, as he went down memory lane, recalling the missteps of African leaders that followed the founders of the union.
“Today, we are talking about economic integration through the African Continental Free Trade Area; yes, it is a laudable project but the African Union seems unable to execute the mandate establishing it.”
For Gyan, that mandate is premised on the promotion of ‘people-to-people’ relations encouraged by free movement across the continent. He noted that it would have been more appropriate for the AU to start first with the implementation of the policy of free movement of people within the continent before the launch of a free trade area. He wondered how free trade would be encouraged when the movement of citizens is restricted through “stupid” demands and unnecessary checkpoints at the borders by immigration and customs officials.
“When you talk about free trade, it means removing some of the border restrictions or barriers. Currently, people travelling across the borders, even at the sub-regional level, for example, between Nigeria and Ghana, face a lot of difficulties.”
But Gyan’s biggest concern over the success of AFCFTA is informed by what he described as lack of trust among Africans, including leaders. He believes that, except Africans learn to trust each other, there would be no successful economic integration process: “Talking about free trade in Africa, do Africans trust each other? Until the issue of trust among Africans is addressed, AFCFTA may not take off successfully.”
Asked to explain what he meant by “trust,” Gyan drew attention to the dubious tendencies of Africans in doing business in sister countries.
“Take, for example, a situation where a drug manufacturer in Ivory Coast would ship drugs that have not met quality control requirements to Mali or Guinea. You know the consequences. Unlike the Europeans, Africans are not honest in doing business. We only think of the money in our pockets.
“Of course, some governments will not allow drugs to be exported to their countries, if they discover that they are fake drugs or they are of sub-standard quality. I give you another example. I travelled to an African country, where the citizens warned me to be careful with Nigerians because, as they put it, Nigerians can do mysterious things. But I had to disabuse their minds by making them know that I have lived in Nigeria for 36 years and I’m at home with the citizens. So, you can understand how crucial the issue of trust is,” he said.
Gyan expressed reservations when told that the AU might have considered and addressed the issue of “trust.” He said, “The picture I have is of a union, where the leaders just sit down, discuss and go home, because they have other things at the back of their mind. When the leaders are not transparent, how do you expect the citizens to be transparent?
“So, what I’m emphasizing here is that, for AFCFTA to take off smoothly, there must be a bond of trust, a bond of honesty, and we must be bold to show it.”
In other words, Gyan believes that free trade can thrive only when Africans express love for one another. He is worried over the discrimination Africans suffer in sister countries either for economic or political reasons.
“I give you the example of Nigeria and Ghana. Ghana learnt good lessons from its mistakes when it sent Nigerians packing. But, unfortunately, Nigeria did not learn from Ghana’s mistakes when it decided to send Ghanaians packing later. One of the consequences was the big vacuum created in Nigeria’s education system because Ghanaian teachers had to leave. These are some of the lessons I want African countries to learn.
“We can’t be talking about free trade when requirements for passports and visa have not been liberalised by the signatories to the agreement. Can you travel to Libya or Morocco from Nigeria because you are an African or because AU has inaugurated free trade area? The answer is no, because you will be deported immediately. And this is because they don’t want to see certain people in their country.
“Don’t forget that free trade area is about the movement of goods or commercial products from one country to another, and you want to believe it is so easy because AU is talking about it? How do you move your goods in the absence of the free movement of people?
“So, the AU should have secured assurance from member states first on the free movement of people while free trade area should have been the next stage. How many years now has AU been talking about the free movement of people without being able to implement it, even at the lowest level, including the sub-regional bodies? Now, we woke up and we jumped to free trade area.”
Gyan wants those who are upbeat about AFCFTA to first study international trade law to understand what is involved for a free trade zone to take off: “It is not enough for people sitting somewhere talking, producing documents and signing, and then they come out to declare the establishment of free trade area.”
Meanwhile, the AU would not have gone public without proper groundwork. But Gyan was of the opinion that “the technical committees that drafted the agreement must have recommended that Africa free trade area can take off based on some mathematical considerations or law . . . but we have 54 countries and 44 were in Kigali, so we should be asking the 10 wise men why they were absent. Of course, they may be considering the implications involved.
“The successful implementation of the agreement should be the concern of all. But, I must stress here that AU has not been operating the way its founders wanted. The founding fathers wanted a proper union of African countries such that a Nigerian can travel to Libya without any constraints, a union where an African can get employed in any other African country other than his home country.
“I will always use countries closer to us to give you examples. Nigeria has electricity problem but in Ghana there is 24-hour supply of electricity. Ghana once had problem with electricity supply but it was solved within a short period of time. Has Nigeria ever decided to bring some engineers from Ghana to assist it, even on contract basis?”
“The Gambia has been appointing its chief judges from Nigeria and other West African countries because it considers them technically qualified, so they are able to fill the vacuum in their judicial system.”
He goes further to cite the abundance of water in Congo Republic, which is not being utilised by other African countries: “Congo can supply the whole of Africa with electricity and there will be no problem as there will be no shortage of water supply because it has a river with quantity of water that can serve the continent. But what effort is being made by African countries to take advantage of the river?”
Even as he emphasised the importance of free movement to the success of AFCFTA, Gyan wondered how free trade could take off in the face of poor transportation, especially bad roads in some parts of the continent.
“A journey by road from Nigeria to Ghana, from Nigeria to Togo and from Nigeria to Benin Republic could take 24 hours instead of six hours. And that is because some of the roads are in poor shape. Even moving from one’s home to the border is a hellish experience.”
Gyan is worried over the inability of Nigeria to play its leadership role in Africa. He described the failure of Nigeria to attend the Kigali summit as “sad.” He said Nigeria is in a position to control the continent but it seems to be afraid of leadership: “The rest of Africa should have learnt so many things from Nigeria, but, for whatever you call leadership fear and all that, Nigeria continues to have problems. We have everything in abundance in Nigeria, so the country should have been the leader of Africa in all aspects.”
He was quick to recall how a plan for the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to have a common currency was thwarted by some people, “It did not work because we did not think ahead. The plan failed because of the selfish interest of some people. At the time, Nigeria had the strongest currency and we said its currency should be adopted as the sub-region’s common currency.
“The Francophone countries were in support. But even Nigerians thought otherwise. The thinking among Nigerians was that they cannot allow their currency to go because the other countries were poor. So, Nigerians were a stumbling block to the plan. If we were thinking ahead, the story would have been different today, particularly for Nigeria and Ghana.”
Gyan wants the Nigerian electorate to vote for credible and visionary leaders who can put the country in its proper position at the continental level. In this regards, he charged Nigerians to de-emphasis party affiliations and consider individual leadership qualities when voting.