Selections to the AfCFTA Council of Ministers must prioritise critical technical experts who are well-versed in trade negotiations and with the right acumen to push the mandate of the single continental market.
This is according to trade practitioner and Executive Director of the AfCFTA Policy Network (APN) Group, Louis Yaw Afful, who says that the presence of such technical brains, whom could be drawn from respective trade ministries, would ensure the continuity of the AfCFTA.
“Signatories and parties to the Africa Continental Free Trade Agreement need to look to critical technical experts within ministries of trade when selecting successors to serve on the Council of Ministers of AfCFTA,” he said on GPHA’s Eye on Port programme.
According to him, although the Council of Ministers constitutes political appointees, often ministers of trade who serve as liaisons between the Heads of State and the AfCFTA Secretariat, they also play critical roles in the negotiation and review processes of the various protocols.
“If you take Mr. Alan Kyerematen critically, he was not just a policy head to implement party manifestos and government agendas. He was more than just that- he was a technical person.
He was at the Africa Trade Policy Centre which is a wing of Economic Community of Africa under UN. He has had initial technical expertise in the whole AfCFTA process.
You can put a trade minister of a different background there but when it comes to a certain cause where technical expertise is needed, there will be an impact of his unavailability.
They have to get somebody with the full technical expertise that he had in the cause for the AfCFTA implementation, else it will slow down Ghana’s drive,” he explained.
According to Mr. Afful, the CEO of the Ghana Export Promotion Authority (GEPA), Afua Asabea Asare and the former CEO of the Ghana Free Zones Authority, and current Deputy Minister of Trade Michael Okyere Baafi are among viable candidates that can take up the role of Ghana’s rep within the Council of Ministers at AfCFTA.
Alternatively, Mr. Afful suggested that the Chief Negotiators at the various Ministries of Trade in party states can play caretaker roles within the Council.
He emphasized the importance of momentum when it comes to the implementation of the free trade agreement and urged party states to endeavor to ensure continuity in spite of political changes.