“…Without necessarily sacrificing our sovereignties, we can forge a political union based on defence, foreign affairs and diplomacy, and a common citizenship, an African currency, a monetary zone and a central bank…” – Kwame Nkrumah
The African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) is the world’s largest free trade area bringing together the 55 countries of the African Union (AU) and eight (8) Regional Economic Communities (RECs). AfCFTA aims to boost intra-Africa trade through an integrated market for the free movement of goods and services across the continent.
In order to take advantage of the agreement’s potential benefits and ensure sustainability, we must tackle barriers on the path to integration. Notable amongst documented impediments, are the artificial country borders, lack of coordination and standardisation in regulations, burdensome procedures for clearing goods and the onerous visa requirements that directly affect the capacity of people and economies to move traded merchandise within and outside their borders. African countries remain closed off to each other, making travel within the continent difficult. According to the Africa Visa Openness Index, Africans need visas to enter 55% of states within the continent. Only the Seychelles, Benin and Gambia offer visa-free access to all Africans, and it is even more restricted for Africans travelling within Africa, as compared to Europeans and North Americans. Clearly, the continent needs a framework that facilitates the free and unrestricted movement of people, in harmony with common rules for controlling borders. When the SDG Advisory Unit of the Office of the President in partnership with the UNDP launched the Champions of Trade, to surface innovative ideas through which AfCFTA could deliver the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the Center for Law and Innovation Policy proposed an AU – AfCFTA sponsored regional visa program, the A-REC visa. Leveraging the existing Regional Economic Community(REC) frameworks the A-REC visa we envisaged that the A-REC visa would facilitate access to specific geographic /economic areas on the continent in much the same way that the Schengen visa facilitates free and unrestricted movement of people, within the European Union. Over 15 million Schengen visa users travelled around Europe in 2019, with additional benefits to countries in the visa-free zone including common border control rules and strengthened common law enforcement systems.
– Virusha Subban, Partner, Head of the Tax Practice.
“….AfCFTA is focused on stimulating growth, creating employment and diversifying economies across the African continent through the creation of a single African market for goods and services. Once the agreement’s ambitious goals are realised, it will help African member states establish new cross-border value chains, encourage foreign investment and better insulate the continent’s economies …”
The African Union recognizes eight regional economic communities under its administration: the Arab Maghreb Union (UMA), the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA), the Community of Sahel-Saharan States (CEN-SAD), the East African Community (EAC), the Economic Community of Southern African States (ECCAS, the Southern African Development Community (SADC), the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD); with multiple overlapping jurisdictions. We could strategically capitalise on the free movement initiatives that already exist in some of the RECs and share best practices; the West African bloc for instance allows the free movement of its people, goods, and services within their territory through an Ecowas protocol that currently facilitates the right of entry and the right of residence. The third phase on the right to establish a business, still awaits implementation. As of 2018, 80 percent of SADC citizens could travel without a visa or obtain one on arrival for a stay of up to 90 days in other SADC Member States. Africa is very likely to witness increases in trading activities and economic dividends at par with what has been recorded by ECOWAS and SADC if steps are taken to enhance human mobility across the entire continent.
Given the A-REC visa’s dependence on Regional Economic Communities, preliminary action could be taken to address the overlapping membership of countries in the groupings, perhaps by consolidating them into 5 units for North, South, East, West and Central Africa, to reduce the associated high management and financial burdens. It is estimated that AfCFTA could help increase combined consumer and business spending to $6.7 trillion by 2030, drive increased production scale, and facilitate the distribution of resources across the continent. Imagine what a harmonised regional e-Immigration system could do for the African continent!
This is an open call to the AfCFTA secretariat and free-movement proponents to persuade national leaders that state -centric positions will only deprive Africa of the benefits the continent stands to gain from free movement.
