The Economic Community of West African States announced recently that the three-member nations where coup plotters overthrew elected governments had finally exited the community. Issues related to coup d’etats in the three exiting West African countries of Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger Republic were what I had made observations about online in the past few months. I have nothing but condemnation for unelected soldiers overthrowing elected representatives. As one whose life’s journey has been impacted by unelected governments (I narrated it on this page), soldiers in politics are an anathema where I am concerned, same as the presence of a former military ruler in Libya, Muammar Gaddafi, despite his much-vaunted performance.

As I have previously submitted here, whatever a military dictator builds will become a ruin. It is a matter of time. Gaddafi had not fallen and what he built had yet to become a ruin, when I began making such submissions about his government pre-2010. My submission then was based on political history in Africa and the ECOWAS region in particular. Years later, ECOWAS emergence and events across its member nations were what I studied in-depth while I was researching ECOWAS-European Union relations for my doctorate in political science. It happened that it was around this same time that ECOWAS leaders had a summit, where they said the organisation should be less about the regional leaders and more about the people. They emphasised “ECOWAS of people”.

The leaders wanted people to be more interconnected, not just the leaders who routinely held summits. So, they introduced measures to ensure that people had this sense of community with people across member nations. How the latest decisions taken by ECOWAS leaders regarding the three exiting nations contribute to this is my focus here. In the statement the leaders put out, I noticed they chose to leave the coup plotters to do their thing while ensuring that channels were left open for contact between their citizens and the rest of the people in the region.

I believe the thinking of the ECOWAS leaders aligns with the views I have been expressing online in the past few months regarding this matter. They are as follows: Earlier on when Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger Republic announced that they formed an alliance, I stated that they could have their alliance and still be in ECOWAS. Actually, ECOWAS, like other international bodies, is an amalgamation of nations involved in different alliances. The European Union and African Union were formed by nations that had diverse alliances among themselves. In West Africa, there were the French-speaking and English-speaking nations in alliances with France and Britain at the time ECOWAS was formed. There are other alliances based on the currency that French-speaking ECOWAS members use i.e. the CFA. Some economic and military sub-alliances remain ECOWAS functions. Even currently some West African nations jointly combat insurgency and other challenges. ECOWAS recognises them and encourages their initiatives as such help promote ECOWAS’ regional integration objective.

Furthermore, I expressed the view that ECOWAS should take its time regarding the three exiting nations since we know that one administration goes and another comes, but a nation and its people remain. Policies in nations can change over time depending on who is in power. I have also stated online that ECOWAS leaders should take a long-term view of relations with the exiting nations, noting that international relations are not conducted just for the short- and medium-term, but mostly the long term. There is a long-term for the three nations in question. Whoever thinks they can rule forever with the gun, having the illusion that they are the only messiah their people have, will ultimately face reality.

In addition, I have stated that ECOWAS leaders should undertake measures which ensure that democratic forces in the three nations are assisted and strengthened to demand a return to civil rule. This to me is the viable route to follow for now. Nonetheless, my expressed views did not gloss over the grudges civilians in the three nations might have against their elected leaders. Arguments about discontent among citizens are ones that some use to justify soldiers in politics. To me it is unacceptable. I stated after the latest coup in the Niger Republic that if people did not like the manner an elected leader frolicked with foreign nations perceived to be fleecing them, the better solution was to mobilise and elect leaders who represented their view on such matters.

To me, soldiers in politics are never the solution to a country’s problems. Soldiers would regiment abracadabra, introducing populist policies that are not assimilated by citizens, and when they go the same citizens return to power. We have seen this across the continent, and I am surprised some still praise soldiers in politics for any reason whatsoever. The reality is that after the initial welcome party, citizens who are muzzled by draconian laws that soldiers make would begin to gather around a cause to return to civilian rule. If this is resisted, the confusion that follows creates conditions for whatever dictators are built to be destroyed. It happened in Libya and other African nations. In Guinea, another West African nation where coup plotters are in power, civilians have begun to stage protests over the agreed transition programme that coup plotters repeatedly ignore.

Back to the thinking of ECOWAS leaders when they announced the final withdrawal of the three nations. They say ECOWAS member nations would continue to recognise all passports and identity cards bearing the ECOWAS logo held by citizens of Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger Republic. The countries would also remain in the bloc’s free-trade scheme. Interestingly, the chairman of the alliance formed by the coup plotters and Mali’s dictator said months ago that the right of ECOWAS citizens to enter, circulate, reside, establish and leave the territories of their new alliance would be maintained. So, coup plotters too want to maintain relationships with people from ECOWAS member nations. Lately, the dictator in Burkina Faso attended the swearing-in ceremony of Ghana’s new president. The three landlocked nations know they cannot close their borders; if they do they will suffer the consequences more. And who casually crosses borders for all manner of reasons? People. The three heads of coup plotters can shut themselves up in their respective nations’ capitals, but their peoples continue to meet others as one community as ECOWAS leadership envisions it.

I think the people-to-people aspect in regional relations has informed most measures adopted by ECOWAS leadership regarding the exiting nations. They should continue on this path. They isolate the coup plotters that way. Coup plotters can gather under their alliance, but a sense of community shared by their people with other people in the region will outlive their different administrations. This consciousness of one community actually informed how ECOWAS leaders did not invade the Niger Republic to restore the ousted elected leader as initially planned. For instance, it took the intervention of the traditional and religious institutions in northern Nigeria, who spoke persuasively about their bonds with peoples across the Nigerian-Nigerien borders for President Bola Tinubu to suspend the plan.

The same sense of a shared community made state governors, traditional leaders, and policymakers from Nigeria, Niger Republic, Chad and Cameroon gather lately for the Lake Chad Basin Governors’ Forum. There they discussed mutual challenges in their localities and how to alleviate them. Meanwhile, worries expressed by some about the withdrawal of the three nations are legitimate. However, I have been stating that those who withdraw have more to lose than ECOWAS members. If security worsens across West Africa, ECOWAS member nations have better support systems. Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger Republic now depend on Russia for support. That is a nation that, though it can help create a nuisance situation, is itself having internal and external challenges.

As things stand, the three exiting nations and their Russian allies suffer heavy losses at the hands of insurgents. Niger Republic’s plan to export crude oil has met with setbacks in Benin Republic. Ultimately, we should not forget that certain human experiences made Libyans under Ghaddafi, for instance, become disenchanted. It made them desire to connect better with the rest of the world and be led by elected representatives. Peoples of the three nations exiting ECOWAS cannot be different if political history is anything to go by.