ECOWAS parliamentarians have pledged commitment to ensure the actualization of single currency for the sub-region.
A member of Parliament from Liberia, Mr Clarence Massaquoi in an interview with journalists at the Extraordinary Session of the of the Fourth Legislature of ECOWAS Parliament in Banjul, Gambia, said the parliamentarians, in the Fifth Legislature, will step up on their oversight functions to ensure that member countries meet the convergence criteria for common currency of the sub-region.
The idea of a common currency for the West African sub-region which was mooted in the hope of boosting cross border trade and economic development has been postponed several times.
Mr Massaquoi said the fourth Legislature did not carry out sufficient follow up as its oversight responsibility, on the implementation of the common currency for the region.
“Oversight responsibility is a major function of any legislative body; we had conferences we had sections in Senegal concerning the Single Currency, we had presentations from the commission and those presentations in my opinion were brilliantly presented.
“Now following up those meetings, it behooves, the parliament to do sufficient follow up on the commission to see what is the status of the implementation of these decisions that were reached.
“I just hope in the next four years we can make some gains,” he said
Mr Massaquoi however expressed optimism that there will be robust debate at the sessions of the Fifth Legislature on issues affecting the region.
“I just hope that the next four years, honestly, we can able to make some gains we need to give ourselves time to debate, we need to give ourselves time to debate, this is not a conference but parliamentary debate.
“We need to rearrange the way we organize our sessions, there should be debate, we should be allowed to critique the commission, and we should be allowed to critique ourselves,” he said.
A parliamentarian from Ghana, Mr Mahama Ayariga, while speaking on the single currency, expressed the commitment of the fifth Legislature to deal with the divide between the Anglophone and Francophone countries in the region which has affected the adoption of a Common Currency for the region.
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