By Ayo Kehinde with Agency reports
President Nana Akufo-Addo of Ghana has warned that West Africa is in great danger as a result of recent coups in the region.
At a key meeting of the Economic Community of West African States, ECOWAS, which he currently chairs the chairs President Akufo-Addo described last year’s military takeover in Mali as “contagious”.
He said there was a need to respond collectively and decisively to stop the trend from devastating the entire region. Shortly after the Mali coup August 2020, a foiled one in Niger in March 2021 with another taking place in Guinea in September 2021, Burkina Faso in January 2022 ago as well as the foiled one in Guinea Bissau on Tuesday, which officials described that as an attempt to seize power from President Umaro Sissoco Embala
The ECOWAS meeting in the Ghanaian capital, Accra, was called in response to last month’s coup in Burkina Faso.
Last year the 15-member bloc imposed sanctions on Mali and Guinea following military takeovers there. But rather than stop the coup plotters have even turned their back on the regional leaders accusing them of looking the other way while dictators pretending to be elected presidents prowl the political landscape with iron fists. As at press time, ECOWAS leaders from Chiefs of Army Staff, Foreign Affairs Ministers and Presidents were still in Burkina Faso trying to secure a firm date on return to civil rule.
