Abuja — ECOWAS leaders are holding an extra-ordinary summit in Abuja on Tuesday, 18th October 2011 on the allocation of statutory positions within the regional organization and Community institutions.
This is part of the move toward more inclusiveness, effectiveness, equity and accountability within the framework of the restructuring of ECOWAS institutions and agencies following the transformation of the defunct ECOWAS Executive Secretariat into the ECOWAS Commission.
The summit, to be presided over by the chair of the Authority of Heads of State and Government and Nigeria's President Goodluck Jonathan, will consider the report and recommendations of the Ad-hoc Committee of Heads of State and Government which met in Lungi Airport near Freetown in Sierra Leone.
That five-nation ad hoc Committee meeting, chaired by Sierra Leone's President Ernest Bai Koroma, was also attended by Presidents Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf of Liberia, Malam Bacaii Sanha of Guinea Bissau and Faure Essozimna Gnassingbe of Togo, while Mali was represented by its Minister for African Integration and Malian abroad, Dr Aliou Macalou.
The Committee was established by the 39th Ordinary session of the Authority of Heads of State and Government held in Abuja in March 2011 and mandated to review the modalities for the allocation of statutory positions in all ECOWAS institutions to Member States of the Community.
It was also charged with proposing a rotational schedule to guide the selection of the Chairperson of the Authority. In discharging its mandate, the Ad-hoc Committee was guided by the relevant policies and principles of the Community as well as provisions of existing laws within ECOWAS.