Nigeria, Others Reject Use Of ‘Eco’ As ECOWAS Single Currency

Nigeria has rejected the decision by Benin Republic, Burkina Faso, Guinea-Bissau, Ivory Coast, Mali, Niger, Senegal, and Togo to adopt Eco in 2020 as a single currency for the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) member countries.

As part of its plans to make Africa a more integrated continent, leaders of the ECOWAS had adopted the name ‘ECO’ for a planned single currency to be used in the region.

ECO is supposed to boost economic development in the West African region and improve cross border trade.

But in December 2019, Benin Republic, Burkina Faso, Guinea-Bissau, Ivory Coast, Mali, Niger, Senegal and Togo, with the backing of France, announced that they were changing their common currency, the CFA Franc, to ECO, through their union, West African Economic and Monetary Union.

But Nigeria in consensus with five other West African countries (Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone) protested this decision saying the action of the francophone ECOWAS countries was not in line with decisions of the Authority of Heads of States and Governments of ECOWAS.

Nigeria’s stance on the currency comes weeks after the Minister of Finance, Zainab Ahmed disclosed that the federal government was monitoring proceedings of the planned currency change, and would respond at the right time.

The move to have a singular currency across the ECOWAS countries  began 30 years ago, but has been experiencing delays due to failure of the countries to reach a consensus.