Abubakar Hashim
The Authority of ECOWAS Heads of States and Governments had brainstormed much earlier before a final decision was agreed who would succeed outgone chairman President Bola Tinubu.
Due to massive herculean tasks and challenges besetting ECOWAS, despite achievements so far, it was decided it was the turn of Sierra Leone.
The decision was collectively agreed for two compelling reasons:
- Sierra Leone is a founding member that ratified the ECOWAS treaty in Lagos in 1975, but had never occupied the chairmanship position.
- Bio, 61, young and swashbuckling, with a military background, who fought with ECOMOG in Liberia and in Sierra Leone, but now, a democrat, who, routinely, advises the military to stay away from politics and adhere to civilian constitutionality, will be useful to bring back the three countries that exited from ECOWAS. Bio was recently invited by President Joseph Boakai to Liberia on the country’s Armed Forces Day, to deliver a keynote address, on the military’s role in civilian dispensations.
Yesterday, from the ECOWAS 67th session in Abuja, Bio arrived in Brussels for the upcoming Global Health Summit tomorrow June 25,2025, co hosted by the EU, Bill Gates Foundation and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance.
The health summit is crucial to Africa and the sub region that is plagued with multiple health challenges.
With a theme, Global Summit: Health and Prosperity through Immunisation, the summit will facilitate about $9 billion to support Gavi’s plan to protect 500 children and save 8 million lives between 2026 and 2030.
The Brussels Health summit will also guard the world, particularly Africa, against pandemics, addressing impacts of conflicts, climate change and other natural calamities
These engagements require stamina, perseverance, passion, required for a position of chairmanship of an organisation like ECOWAS that is currently facing huge existential challenges.
*Abubakar Hashim, based in Sierra Leone, is the West Africa Bureau Chief of TheNEWS magazine