What to know about the West African economic summit seeking regional reform

The 69th ECOWAS summit was held on July 19th in Freetown, Sierra Leone.The outgoing Chair of the ECOWAS Conference of Heads of State and Government, Julius Maada Bio, set the tone by calling for “far-reaching changes” within the West African economic organisation.The meeting was also marked by the Senegalese Head of State taking up the rotating presidency of ECOWAS, as well as by strong criticism from Guinea, which condemned the sanctions imposed by the organisation in recent years.