The Authority of Heads of State of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) have unanimously endorsed the candidature of President John Dramani Mahama as African Union (AU) Chair for 2027.
The endorsement follows an earlier one by ECOWAS Foreign Affairs Ministers for West Africa to lead the continental body.
The backing for President Mahama was firmed up at the 68th Ordinary Session of the ECOWAS Authority of Heads of State held in Abuja on Sunday, December 14, 2025.
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By this, President Mahama, the current second Vice Chair, is the AU Chairperson-in-waiting when the mantle falls to West Africa in February next year. He will replace the current Chair, President João Manuel Gonçalves Lourenço of Angola.
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President Mahama is also the AU’s Champion for Reparatory Justice for Africans and People of African Descent; African Financial Institutions, as well as Gender and Development Issues.
The AU Chairmanship rotates annually among the five regions of Africa – North, West, East, Central and South.
President Mahama becomes the 23rd Chair of the AU and the second Ghanaian president to lead the regional body after President John Agyekum Kufuor in 2007.
Endorsing his candidature, the ECOWAS Council noted President Mahama’s stature on the continent and in the world, and Ghana’s role as a key ECOWAS member state with enormous influence on the bloc’s international reputation.
President of the ECOWAS Commission, Dr Omar Touray, communicating the decision said President Mahama’s competence and capacity to represent West Africa and lead the continent was key in the decision.
According to Dr Toure, the Heads of State have full confidence in President Mahama to discharge the responsibilities of the AU chair with clarity and vision.
President Mahama will take office at a time his ECOWAS region is in political turbulence following military take-overs in recent years, with the latest being a failed coup attempt in Benin on the back of a successful one in Guinea-Bissau two weeks earlier.
Condemning the coups, ECOWAS Chair, President Julius Maada Bio of Sierra Leone, commended the deployment of the region’s standby force to foil the takeover in Benin.
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He said the ECOWAS, 50 years on, was at a critical juncture stressing that “our collective security and our democratic resilience are under test”.
As part of measures to enhance trade, the Assembly committed to reviewing the ECOWAS Trade Liberalisation Scheme (ETLS) and announced the decision by member states to abolish air transport taxes by 25 per cent, effective January 1, 2026 to reduce travel costs within the region.
BY JULIUS YAO PETETSI
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