Rwanda seeks to rejoin central African bloc

Rwanda is set to rejoin the Economic Community of Central African States (Eccas), six years after it pulled out of the regional bloc, it has emerged.The development was announced yesterday by Foreign minister Louise Mushikiwabo during a visit to the Republic of Congo.“My Rep. of Congo counterpart (Basile) Ikouebe & I informed our teams Rwanda soon to be welcomed back in CEEAC (French acronym for Eccas), Community of Central African States,” the minister wrote on Twitter.When Rwanda ended its membership of Eccas in 2007 it had just joined the East African Community (EAC), now a five-member bloc, with the other partner states being Burundi (also in a member of Eccas), Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda.Then, Kigali justified that action saying it was trying to avoid overlapping memberships in several regional community groupings.Eccas is a regional community of 10 central African states, namely; Angola, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Republic of Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon and Sao Tome & Principe.Many African countries, including both EAC and Eccas members, belong to multiple regional communities.In addition to EAC, Rwanda is also a member of the 20-nation Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa), and the wobbly Economic Community of the Great Lakes Countries (CEPGL), which also includes Burundi and DRC.According to Rwanda’s Ambassador to DRC, Amandin Rugira, Kigali has applied for readmission to Eccas and chances are “very high” that it will be welcomed back during the bloc’s next heads of state summit.The summit is expected to take place early next year in N’Djamena, the capital of Chad, the current chair of the bloc.Asked why Rwanda was now seeking to rejoin a grouping it has previously withdrawn from, Rugira, also the country’s envoy to a couple of other Eccas member states besides the DRC, pointed to new realities.“When we requested to pull out a lot was going on then. We wanted to first concentrate on the East African Community (EAC) which we had just joined and felt it was not a good idea to stay in a bloc where we would not be active members,” said the diplomat.He added, “But after making progress with regard to the EAC integration process, and then increasingly building bilateral ties with individual member states of Eccas, we feel it is time to join up.”Over the past few years Rwanda has increasingly stepped up bilateral cooperation with several countries in the central African region, such as Congo-Brazzaville and Gabon, where the national carrier, RwandAir, now operates regular flights between their capital cities and Kigali.The airline also operates a flight between Brazzaville to Libreville. RwandAir is also planning to launch flights to Douala in Cameroon after signing an agreement with the country this week.Speaking to Saturday Times yesterday, John Mirenge, the chief executive of RwandAir, welcomed Rwanda’s move to rejoin the central African bloc, saying this will come with increased business and economic opportunities.“Economic integration is always good for our kind of business, especially on matters of policy. We are establishing a strong presence in that region and, therefore, strengthening ties with the Eccas states at the highest level will be a win-win scenario,” he said yesterday.RwandAir also operates cargo flights to and from several Eccas destinations.Minister Mushikiwabo said yesterday that Rwanda and Congo Brazaville were “making good progress in sectors of ICT, air transport, agriculture products, police and security.”Eccas was established in 1983 as a new grouping bringing together member states of what was known as the Customs and Economic Union of Central Africa (UDEAC; Cameroon, CAR, Chad, Congo, Equatorial Guinea and Gabon) and the three member states of CEPGL.The grouping seeks to foster economic ties and as well as peace and security among member states.

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Rwanda seeks to rejoin central African bloc