President of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), Dr Omar Alien Touray, has advocated unity as a means to overcoming the arrays of challenges facing the African sub-region.
He made the call in his message to the citizens of the member states on the occasion of the 49th anniversary of the creation of the ECOWAS Commission.
Dr Touray congratulated the member states on the achievements and positive results since the founding fathers signed the treaty creating ECOWAS, including uniting the peoples around the common ideals of shared prosperity.
He, however, acknowledged that the Community has continue to face a number of challenges threatening its continued existence, including insecurity, displacement of a large number of the population and food insecurity.
“Precisely 49 years ago, the Founding Fathers signed the treaty creating the Economic Community of West African States. Since then, ECOWAS has served the region and continues to unite our peoples around the common ideals of shared prosperity.
“As we celebrate ECOWAS 49th anniversary, let us recall some of the tangible and positive results the Community has to its credit.
“These achievements can be seen in many areas including free movement of our people, intra community trade, regional energy, and transport infrastructure, governance as well as in peace and security.
“We remain convinced that together we can build on these achievements and attain the objectives in our Vision 2050 “of a fully integrated Community of peoples in a peaceful and prosperous region with strong institutions that respect fundamental freedoms and work towards inclusive and sustainable development,” the ECOWAS President stated.
In spite of the achievements, Dr Touray said “but the Community continues to face a number of challenges.
“As we celebrate our 49th anniversary, insecurity continues to threaten our region. Some of our member states are battling terrorist groups on a daily basis and large number of our population face displacement and food insecurity.”
He however said all hopes were not and advocated that staying united was a sure way to overcome the identified problems and challenges facing the region.
“It is clear that we must stay united if we want to be successful in the fight against insecurity. But it is our unity which now stands threatened.
“We must do everything to preserve our unity because to quote General Yakubu Gowon, one of the founding fathers of ECOWAS, neither the generation of our founding fathers, ‘nor the present or future generations can understand or will be forgiving for the breakup of our community’.
“Strengthening regional unity, peace and security” is the theme we have chosen for the celebration of this 49th anniversary.
“This theme has been chosen to reflect our current challenges and also to remind us all of the need to work to preserve regional unity and peace, two cherished objectives set for us by ECOWAS Founding Fathers.
“These are goals that the ECOWAS Heads of State and Government work to safeguard every day through their efforts to ensure the security of our people and protect the integrity of our territories,” he said.
The ECOWAS President thanked the leaders, both past and present, members of the Community as well as the staff of all ECOWAS institutions and agencies for the sacrifices they make every day to promote its objectives.
“I would also like to extend my gratitude to all our local and international partners for their consistent support to ECOWAS in the implementation of the various Community projects and programmes.
“We are convinced that in unity, we will preserve peace and strengthen our actions for the security of our member states and our people.
“Through unity, we will preserve regional stability and the harmonious political and socio-economic development of our community.
“It is with these words of hope that I would like to close my message. I wish our Community and all of us a Happy Anniversary,” the ECOWAS President stated.
