Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey
The Minister for Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration, Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey, has urged the Council of ECOWAS ministers to make the subregional bloc efficient and effective.
According to her, making ECOWAS an efficient and effective body will help positively impact the lives of citizens in the West African subregion.
She made the call in her opening remarks at the extraordinary session of the ECOWAS Council of Ministers in Accra on Tuesday, October 5 2021.
The meeting was aimed at finding a resolution to the modality for the allocation of statutory positions and adopting organogram of section members with its associated departments as well as measures to further streamline ECOWAS operating cost.
The Minister observed the need to finding consensus on 15 statutory positions for the 15-member states to enable the participation of every member in the activities of ECOWAS.
She noted that the last ECOWAS Summit took the decision to reduce the size of the commission from 15 to 7 members.
“Following this decision, the commission prepared a report on each of the specific point considered at the summit and circulated to ministers”, she added.
She appealed to members of the council to work together to present a report that will facilitate the work of the authority at its 60th Ordinary session which will be held on December 18, 2021.
She called for a collective collaboration of practical and attainable reforms that will usher ECOWAS into a new era of productivity, cost efficiency, quality service delivery and excellence to the benefits of citizens.
Meanwhile, she was optimistic that the long-standing show of solidarity which has been the basis of the community decisions over the years, no matter how difficult the issue, will once again be demonstrated in the outcomes of the meeting.
By: Annie Wharton Savage.