Migration Issues in West Africa

The Dakar experts meeting in March 2007 on the "ECOWAS Joint Approach on Migration" has outlined, from the West African viewpoint, four questions that should be addressed:

• How can the benefits of intra-regional mobility be optimised and how can free
  movement within the ECOWAS zone be guaranteed?
• How can mobility be supported and local development in departure zones and other
  potential host areas be encouraged?
• How can legal migration towards third countries be optimised, notably in Europe,
  North America, within the rest of Africa and the world?
• How can illegal and clandestine migration be brought under control?

The ECOWAS Commission was provided with the mandate to define a joint regional approach on migration at the 30th Ordinary ECOWAS Heads of State and Government Summit in Abuja in June 2006. At the meeting in Ouagadougou on 20 December 2006, the ECOWAS Mediation and Security Council reaffirmed this priority, requesting the Commission President to: “pursue the consultative process for the definition of a common approach to the management of intra-regional migration and migration to Europe in all its aspects”. Undertaking this mandate, the ECOWAS Commission initiated a strategic thinking process with a view to defining a joint regional approach on migration.

> Read the mission report on the draft proposal for an "ECOWAS Joint Approach on Migration" (French only