News:
Chairman Snowe J.
October 6, 2022
As part of the work programme of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Parliament, Chairman of the Committee on Political Affairs, Peace, Security and Africa Peer Review Mechanism (APRM), Senator Edwin Mervin Snowe Jr., Rt. Hon Dr Sidie Mohammed Tunis and Secretary General John Azumah would pay a working visit to Guinea Conakry, Mali and Burkina Faso to meet the authorities and citizens.
Chairman Snowe Jr. in an interview noted that this is the role the Community Parliament is also playing to see how the three states return to constitutional rule. According to him they are very concerned with statements coming from authorities of Guinea Conakry towards ECOWAS and the security situation in Mali that is being supported by Russia; “Mali and Guinea military juntas are working together and there has been visit by the Guinea leader to Mali”.
Again, there is a situation in Burkina Faso and he was wondering which direction they are going, hence the need to be a little more vigilant. “Guinea for example, if ECOWAS had been strong on the military junta trying to resist what their former ousted president was trying to do, we may not have been at where we are today. We need to do more and fight more, we need to talk more and negotiate more, so that we can put a stop to it but again the situation of Russian presence in the country affected by military coup is quite alarming”.
He further noted that ECOWAS needs to do something; a country like Burkina Faso in the wake of their coup, they burning the French embassy destroying the visa section does not speak well of the sub-region, it works against the region. As to whether the chair of the Authority of Heads of States and Government has the full support of the Parliament, he responded in the affirmative and pointed out that he as chair of the Political Affairs Committee together with the Speaker had paid a working visit to the Chair of Authority of Heads of States and Government.
Again, the chair is former military personnel, he has been tough and pushing for additional sanction and shows that the screws are being tightened. There has been some resistant but ECOWAS would not be deterred about it. “We are fully behind the Head of States, we are Ecowas and we are here to ensure the right decisions are implemented and turn our region into a truly constitutional region”, he said.
Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com