Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso to Launch New Confederation Passport Despite ECOWAS’ Push for Reintegration

In July, ECOWAS tasked Senegalese President Bassirou Diomaye Faye with leading negotiations that might bring Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso back into the regional bloc. This was around the same time the three junta-led countries held the first summit of the new AES confederation, five months after its leaders announced they would be pulling out of ECOWAS.

“Our people have turned its back irrevocably to ECOWAS, it’s now up to us to create AES,” Niger’s head of state, Abdourahamane Tchiani, said during the summit in Niamey, capital of Niger. “[AES] is an alternative to any artificial regional grouping, by building a sovereign community of peoples.”

Adding to Tchiani’s remarks, Burkina Faso President Ibrahim Traoré stated that ECOWAS was subject to imperialism from the West, especially as the member states of the newly-formed AES have severed ties with their former colonizers, France, and is bent on not being associated with anything French-adjacent.

The formation of AES symbolically strengthens the alliance between Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso, and continues a collective coldness towards ECOWAS. All three countries experienced coups between 2021 and 2023, with the regional bloc suspending each country and imposing sanctions after every coup. Last year’s hardline stance by ECOWAS against the coup in Niger was integral in the three countries coming together for common purposes.

Chaired by Nigerian President Bola Tinubu, ECOWAS threatened Niger with military intervention if overthrown President Mohamed Bazoum wasn’t reinstated. The country’s assets in ECOWAS banks were frozen, 70 percent of its electricity, from neighboring Nigeria, was cut off, and a no-fly zone on commercial flights to and from Niger was instituted. Shortly after, Niger allied itself with Mali and Burkina Faso, who already had their gripes with ECOWAS.

In late February, ECOWAS lifted several financial and economic sanctions placed on the three countries, as well as Guinea, which had been suspended following the 2021 coup. However, coming a month after Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso announced their exit from ECOWAS, the removal of the sanctions was seen as a move to placate the three countries, which the regional bloc said were “important members of the Community.”

During the ECOWAS summit held in Nigeria's capital, Abuja, on Sunday, a day after the AES summit, ECOWAS Commission President Omar Touray reiterated the strategic importance of reintegrating the withdrawn states. A big part of that is the armed insurgency that has rocked parts of West Africa, of which thousands have been killed and millions displaced between the three countries and beyond.

“Our region is also faced with the risks of disintegration,” Touray said, adding that the suspended member states were allowed to join in on meetings related to quelling insecurity in the region.

Touray also noted that the withdrawal of Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso would have diplomatic and economic consequences, saying that ECOWAS would be forced to stop economic projects in these countries worth over $500 million. “When you get out of an agreement, certainly you don’t become part of that agreement. If it is about free trade, free movement of people, the risk of losing those concessions remains,” Touray said.

Meanwhile, officials from the AES member states have continued to double down on their ECOWAS exit. “Our heads of state were very clear in Niamey when they said the withdrawal of the three countries from ECOWAS is irrevocable and was done without delay, and from now on we must stop looking in the rear-view mirror,” Mali’s foreign minister, Abdoulaye Diop, said in an interview with state broadcaster ORTM on Monday evening.

“I don’t really think the current regimes will consider rejoining ECOWAS, which they see as connected to Western interest,” military reporter and Janes journalist Erwan de Cheriseytold Al Jazeera’s Inside Story. None of the three countries is on track for a regime change or a return to democracy. Earlier this year, Mali extended the stay of its junta for three years and Burkina Faso extended its transition period for a further five years, while Niger’s proposed return to democracy is set for 2026.

According to analysts, however, Senegal’s Faye is the best possible candidate for ECOWAS’s negotiation with the three countries. Faye’s recent, gilded entrance into office came on the back of an election that was widely regarded as credible, an important factor in a region where elections aren’t generally known to be free and fair and democratic institutions are malleable to the whims of presidents.

In fact, Togolese President Fauré Gnassingbe — the other chief facilitator appointed by ECOWAS — is set to continue his two decades in office for the foreseeable future, following a much-criticized constitutional change.

Faye is expected to do the heavy lifting and, beyond his credibility as the youngest elected African president, his pan-African stance and active measures to remove the exploitation of Western imperialism from Senegal is expected to resonate with the leaders of Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso.

“Like the other [AES] heads of state, [Faye] claims sovereignty and a break with the old order,” Seidik Abba, a Sahel specialist and president of the International Center for Reflection for Studies, told AP News.

Currently, the standoff between ECOWAS and the three withdrawn states is playing a role in the Niger-Benin oil pipeline dilemma, and Mali’s government has already hinted at the possibility of nationals of AES members needing visas to move around other West African countries, and vice versa. This is reflective of the level of diplomatic problems that could continue if a working cordiality isn’t reached soon.

According to Touray, “disintegration will not only disrupt the freedom of movement and settlement of people, but it will also worsen insecurity in the region.”