Nigeria’s former Minister of Finance and one time Minister of Foreign Affairs, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has welcomed as a relief, the endorsement from the  Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) for her candidature for the position of Director-General of the World Trade Organisation. It could be recalled that Nigeria had formally nominated Dr Okonjo-Iweala, an economist and also former Managing Director Operations World Bank, for the position for the period 2021-2025.

According to a statement by the chairperson of the ECOWAS Heads of State and Government Mahamadou Issoufou also called on other African countries and non-African countries to support her candidature.“…Since the creation of the World Trade Organization (WTO) on 1 January 1995, which is a successor to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) established on 1 January 1948, no African has assumed the position of Director-General of the Organization,” the statement said in part.

Expressing her appreciation to the ECOWAS, she said in a tweet that : “A big thank you to the Economic Community of West African States @ecowas_cedeao for supporting my candidacy for DG @wto.” While this endorsement is a welcome relief, analysts say that this will definitely pit ECOWAS against other regional groupings across Africa who seem to have accepted African Union’s earlier endorsement of the Egyptian candidate.

Kelechi Deca

Kelechi Deca has over two decades of media experience, he has traveled to over 77 countries reporting on multilateral development institutions, international business, trade, travels, culture, and diplomacy. He is also a petrol head with in-depth knowledge of automobiles and the auto industry