The Commission of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS Commission) was transformed from an ECOWAS Secretariat in 2007 implements the vision, mission and objectives of ECOWAS as a regional grouping of fifteen (15) Member States. With its headquarters is in Abuja, Nigeria, the Commission is headed by the President, assisted by a Vice President and five Commissioners, comprising experienced professionals who are providing the leadership to achieve the vision of the founding fathers of “a borderless region where the population has access to its abundant resources and is able to exploit them through the creation of opportunities under a sustainable environment”.
The President of the Commission is the Chief Executive Officer of the Community and all its Institutions. The Commission executes the Decisions taken by the Authority and application of the Regulations of the Council. The Commission is also responsible for the promotion of Community development programmes and projects as well as multinational enterprises of the region, convening as and when necessary meetings of sectoral Ministers to examine sectoral issues which promote the achievement of the objectives of the Community, preparation of draft budgets and programmes of activity of the Community and supervision of their execution upon their approval by Council, submission of reports on Community activities to all meetings of the Authority and Council, among others.
The ECOWAS commission is pre-occupied with the implementation of critical and strategic programmes that will deepen cohesion and progressively eliminate identified barriers to full integration. In this way, the estimated 300 million citizens of the community can ultimately take ownership for the realization of the new vision of moving from an ECOWAS of States to an “ECOWAS of the People: Peace and Prosperity to All” by 2050.
The Commission is grouped into Departments and directorates, it is a multilateral institution of statutory, professional and general staff, from diverse cultural, ethnic, national, occupational, gender, intellectual and professional backgrounds, tasked to realize the mission, vision and objectives set under the ECOWAS Protocols, to help achieve the mandate under the ECOWAS treaty of 1975, revised in 1993.
