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West Africa: New Subregional Grouping Seeks to Integrate Regional Citizens
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Public Agenda (Accra)
12 May 2008
Posted to the web 12 May 2008
Ebenezer Hanson
The Co-prosperity Alliance Zone (COPAZ), the newly created subregional grouping, comprising Ghana, Nigeria, Togo and Benin, has been urged to work towards the integration of nationals of the member countries, rather than the States.
With this approach, the citizens of the respective countries will have a sense of belongingness and share a common goal. The new regional body is aimed at fast-tracking the integration of the economies of the four west-African neighbours.
The Executive Secretary of the COPAZ, Dr. Fatal Adeyemi, gave the advice when addressing the official opening of the 3rd Meeting of Experts of COPAZ Conference in Accra last Thursday.
" I urge members to rise above national interest and work towards ensuring an integration of our people. COPAZ should be seen as alliance of people and not of States," he emphasized.
COPAZ was established on February 8, 2007 with Nigeria, Benin and Togo as founding countries with Ghana joining on February 13, 2008.
At the inauguration, the then Nigerian President, Olusegun Obasanjo said:
"The COPAZ which we are inaugurating today is not a political agenda, but an economic-oriented and development-centered initiative.
"We believe in shared prosperity with our neighbours and through the partnership, we hope to harness our joint material and human resources for the collective benefits of our peoples."
Obasanjo identified common challenges among the three countries as high levels of illiteracy, inadequate healthcare, undeveloped communication systems, high unemployment and rapid population growth.
Dr. Adeyemi recalled that the founding fathers saw COPAZ as an alternative development platform to fastrack the integration and also to enhance South-South Co-operation. He noted that the formation of COPAZ is not simply based on the proximity of countries but on the need to deal with the reality of stark poverty among their citizens.
He regretted COPAZ's lack of a permanent secretariat and logistics and called on member countries to expedite action to enable COPAZ to prosecute its mandate.
The Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Regional Integration and NEPAD, Dr. Charles Brempong Yeboah, believed that the co-operation among COPAZ members would be a formidable tool to "successfully address the great challenge of our generation-the eradication of mass poverty through purposeful socio-economic development."
He disclosed that COPAZ is establishing a strong project-based foundation, especially the electricity inter-connection among the countries, in addition to the West African Gas Pipeline Project.
The Protocol to the Memorandum of Understanding on COPAZ provides for comprehensive framework for political, economic and social collaboration and focuses, among others, on Foreign Policy, Interior and Security, Finance and Development, Education, Commerce, and Industry, Transportation and Communication, Infrastructure and culture.
The rest are Tourism and Sports, Justice, Mines, Energy and Petroleum Resources, Agriculture and Water Resources.
Dr. Brempong-Yeboah reiterated that COPAZ is not only based on geographical, cultural and historical ties but also the need to ensure peaceful co-existence and sharing of prosperity on the basis of joint platform.
"There is the need to critically examine the priority areas, while focusing on the aspirations of our leaders, especially in this era of globalisation where we have to harmonize policies and strengthen co-operation to empower our people," he notes.
The agenda for the meeting included brainstorming on the Draft Protocol, the Draft Budget, the proposed COPAZ logo and the agenda for the conference.
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A Summit of Heads of State and Government on COPAZ was expected to follow the Meeting of Experts on Saturday.
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