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Democratization And Militarization In West African Sub-region
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CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1. Background of the Study
Economic
Community of West African States (ECOWAS) was established in 1975
primarily to facilitate economic integration and development in West
African sub-region. But over the years, the regional economic
organization evolved into regional security organization through its
military intervention in the conflict situations in the member states
and as well created a new organ, ECOWAS Ceasefire Monitoring Group
(ECOMOG). The peacekeeping intervention began with Liberian civil in
1989 to Sierra Leone in 1997, Guinea Bissau in 1998, Liberian Second
Civil War in 1999, Cote d’Ivoire in 2002, Second Cote d’Ivoire Civil War
in 2011, and Mali in 2012 and Second Guinea Bissau crisis in 2012
(Agyapong, 2005; Belmakki, 2005; Levitt, 2008; Francis, 2009;
Olonisakin, 2010; Yabi, 2010; Kabia, 2011).
The ECOWAS recognizes the
fact that no meaningful economic integration and development will be
possible under conditions of conflicts as the sub-region was fast
assuming the status of conflict region. Prior to the military
intervention, ECOWAS had always relied on traditional method of conflict
resolution as a result of widespread conflict and instability in the
sub-region in the 1990s and early 2000s, the leaders came to the
realization that economic prosperity cannot be achieved in the
absence of peace and security. For example before the Liberian conflict
in 1989, the ECOWAS relied on traditional conflict resolution
mechanisms like mediation in Niger and other cases in the sub-region
(Agyapong, 2005; Francis, 2009). ECOWAS is becoming more a regional
security organization. But that does not mean total jettisoning of
traditional conflict resolution mechanisms as the cases in Togo in 2005
where democracy was restored after military coups, demonstrated. Even in
the cases of military intervention, traditional methods of imposing
sanctions and encouraging dialogue with the regimes were exhausted
(Suifon, 2005; Levitt, 2008).
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ABSRACT - [ Total Page(s): 1 ]The study is basically a qualitative research method relying mainly on secondary sources of data from internet sources, official documents and country websites as the method of data collection. We made use of qualitative-descriptive analysis as our method of data analysis, that is, documentary studies of official document and other materials in analyzing the secondary data. The major purpose of embarking on this research is to assess the democratization and militarization in the West African sub ... Continue reading---
