Togo: Under President Faure Gnassingbé, on the path to the advent of the ECO, the ECOWAS single currency!
Legal proceedings are underway for the adoption of the Ecowas single currency. In Togo, the national representation held its 6th plenary session of the 1st ordinary session of the year 2023 at its headquarters in Lomé. The proceedings focused on the voting of a new law on aggregated management centres and the adoption of a bill ratifying the monetary cooperation agreement between the governments of the UEMOA member states and the French government, signed in 2019 in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire. The session was chaired by the honorable Yawa Djigbodi Tsègan, President of the National Assembly, in the presence of Ministers Sani Yaya of Economy and Finance and Christian Trimua in charge of relations with the Institutions of the Republic.
Indeed, the ratification of the monetary cooperation agreement aims to implement the reforms of the CFA franc with the vision of preparing the economies of the UEMOA member states for the advent of the ECO, the ECOWAS single currency.
According to sources close to the matter, the ratification of this agreement will also allow Togo to notify the other Union member states of the completion of the internal procedure necessary for the entry into force of the agreement.
The Minister of Economy, Mr. Sani Yaya, expressed his satisfaction on this occasion and emphasized that the parliamentary vote is part of the dynamic vision of President Faure Gnassingbé’s government, which meets the needs of sovereignty and monetary cooperation.
In this regard, the Minister of Economy highlighted that this agreement carries important decisions, including the cessation of the centralization of foreign exchange reserves in the French Treasury, the closure of the operational account, and the transfer of available resources in the account to the BCEAO (Central Bank of West African States), as well as the withdrawal of all French representatives from the decision-making and management bodies of the UEMOA (Board of Directors of the BCEAO, Banking Commission, and Monetary Policy Committee).
He further specified that « the ratification of this new agreement is an opportunity for our country to play its part in the concert of Union countries and to lay the groundwork for a successful transition towards the realization of the ECOWAS single currency project, which is the ECO».
It should be noted that the new monetary cooperation agreement, signed on December 21, 2019, in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, between the governments of the UEMOA member states and the government of the French Republic, represents a significant revision of the agreement in force since December 4, 1973.
Therefore, the 15 ECOWAS member states adopted a roadmap for the launch of the ECO as the single currency by 2027 during their summit held on June 19, 2021, in Accra, Ghana.
Yoann Amouzou
