The three countries, which are currently under military rule, said they ceased to be members of ECOWAS as the regional body had allegedly “moved away from the ideals of its founding fathers and pan-Africanism.”

But the ECOWAS Commission, in a swift reaction, said it was not aware of the withdrawal of the three countries, adding that “Burkina Faso, Niger, and Mali remain important members of the Community and the Authority.”

In a joint statement on Sunday “done in Ouagadougou, Bamako and Niamey” by their military leaders, Capt. Ibrahim Traoré (Burkina Faso), Col. Assimi Goita (Mali), and Brig. Gen. Abdourahamane Tiani (Niger Republic), the three countries announced their withdrawal from ECOWAS.

They claimed that ECOWAS had become a threat to its member states.

“Eager to achieve integration between the states of the sub-region and driven by the ideals of brotherhood, solidarity, mutual aid, peace and development, their Excellencies General Aboubacar Sangoulé Lamizana, General Moussa Traoré and Lieutenant Colonel Seyni Kountchė, respectively Heads of State of Upper Volta (current Burkina Faso), Mali and Niger, created with12 of their peers, on May 28, 1975, in Lagos, the Economic Community of West African States.

“After 49 years of existence, the valiant people of Burkina, Mali and Niger note with much regret, bitterness and great disappointment that their organisation has moved away from the ideals of its founding fathers and pan-Africanism.

“Furthermore, ECOWAS, under the influence of foreign powers, betraying its founding principles, has become a threat to its member states and its populations whose happiness it is supposed to ensure,” the statement read.

The joint statement accused ECOWAS of failing to assist the three countries in fighting “existential” threats like terrorism — the common reason cited by their militaries for deposing their democratically elected governments.

“Indeed, the organisation has not provided assistance to our states in the context of our existential fight against terrorism and insecurity; worse, when these states decided to take their destiny into their own hands, it adopted an irrational and unacceptable posture by imposing illegal, illegitimate, inhumane and irresponsible sanctions in violation of its own texts; all things which have further weakened populations already bruised by years of violence imposed by instrumentalised and remote-controlled terrorist hordes,” they said.

They noted that their membership withdrawal was with immediate effect.

“Faced with this continuing situation, Their Excellencies, Captain Ibrahim Traoré, Colonel Assimi Goita and Brigadier General Abdourahamane Tiani, respectively Heads of State of Burkina Faso, the Republic of Mali and the Republic of Niger, taking all their responsibilities in the face of history and responding to the expectations, concerns and aspirations of their populations, decide in complete sovereignty on the immediate withdrawal of Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger from the Economic Community of West African States,” it added.

But responding in a communique released in Abuja on Sunday, the ECOWAS Commission said it had yet to receive a direct formal notification about Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger’s withdrawal from the West Africa regional bloc.

“The attention of the Commission of the Economic Community of West African States has been drawn to a statement broadcast on the National Televisions of Mali and Niger announcing the decision of Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger to withdraw from ECOWAS.

The ECOWAS Commission is yet to receive any direct formal notification from the three member states about their intention to withdraw from the community.

“The ECOWAS Commission, as directed by the Authority of Heads of State and Government, has been working assiduously with these countries for the restoration of constitutional order.

“Burkina Faso, Niger, and Mali remain important members of the Community and the Authority remains committed to finding a negotiated solution to the political impasse.

The ECOWAS Commission remains seized with the development and shall make further pronouncements as the situation evolves,” the communique read.

Struggling with jihadist violence and poverty, the regimes have had tense ties with ECOWAS since coups took place in Niger last July, Burkina Faso in 2022 and Mali in 2020.

All three were suspended from ECOWAS, with Niger and Mali facing heavy sanctions.

ECOWAS had imposed economic sanctions on Niger in July 2023, following a military coup which ousted President Mohamed Bazoum.

The sanctions include a ban on travel, border closure and a freeze on assets belonging to the government and its supporters.

The prime minister appointed by Niger’s military regime on Thursday blasted ECOWAS for “bad faith” after the bloc largely shunned a planned meeting in Niamey.

Sunday’s announcement was the latest twist in a series of events that had deepened political tension in West Africa since it experienced its latest of a string of coups — in Niger — last year. It also comes as the three nations have formed a security alliance after severing military ties with France and other European nations and turning to Russia for support.

Meanwhile, the President of the ECOWAS Court, Justice Edward Asante, on Sunday, called on justices and other court officials to strive for the unity of member countries.

He encouraged them to avoid conflicts and any behaviour that could harm the court’s ability to fulfill its assigned mandate.

He spoke at the dinner and award ceremony held on Saturday to mark the commencement of activities for the new year in Abuja.

Asante said, “Let us work together as a family so that we can achieve everything we want to achieve for our communities. We should bear in mind that we are not working for ourselves but for our communities. We have to be more committed and dedicated. We should be able to do other tasks assigned to us. To benefit the entire subregion and especially the indigent citizens of our community. I will also urge us to foster unity. Which is the most important thing for our court. We need to work together as one family. Bickering among each other will not help us to achieve the mandates of the court.”

Asante also called on court staff to prepare for upcoming cost-cutting measures to be implemented throughout the year.

This, he said was a result of the dwindling revenue of the court.

He said,  “The community we work for is in serious financial crisis.  Community levy is dwindling and we have to bear in mind that missions are going to reduce. Today you might be selected for a mission, and be very important for a particular mission the next time you may not be.

“Everybody should brace themselves up for it. It is not about favoritism but the quality of work and relevance to particular programmes. We did very well last year and we should pat ourselves on the back and look up to a better year this year. ‘’

The court was founded in 2001 to uphold and apply principles of equity in interpreting and applying the provisions of the Revised Treaty, along with other legal instruments adopted by member countries.

The court is located in the Federal Capital Territory,  Abuja.

The leaders of the three Sahel nations on Sunday issued a statement saying it was a “sovereign decision” to leave the ECOWAS “without delay”.

Struggling with jihadist violence and poverty, the regimes have had tense ties with ECOWAS since coups took place in Niger last July, Burkina Faso in 2022 and Mali in 2020.

All three were suspended from ECOWAS, with Niger and Mali facing heavy sanctions.

The EU Foreign Policy Chief, Josep Borrell, in a statement, said ”Around 100 civilians, including women and children, were believed killed in a massacre.”

According to AFP, it is not clear who was behind the November 6 attack in the village of Zaongo. However, Borrell called on Burkina Faso’s military junta to shed light on the circumstances of the deaths. It has not yet responded.

Burkina Faso is trying to contain a jihadist insurgency that spread from neighbouring Mali.

The military government has been forcing civilians to join the fight against the Islamist groups, who are said to control about 40% of the country.

About a quarter of Burkina Faso’s schools have been forced to close because of the insurgency, according to aid agencies.

One resident told the AFP news agency that Zaongo was one of the few villages in the area not to have been “emptied out by the terrorists”.

“Some suspected the inhabitants of collaborating with them,” the resident said.

The army seized power last year, vowing to stop the jihadist attacks. If anything, the number of deaths has since increased.

Last year was the country’s most deadly on record, according to the U.S.-based Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (Acled), with more than 1,400 civilian deaths.

So far this year, almost 8,000 people have been reported killed due to violence in the country, Acled said.

The bill, adopted unanimously by the interim parliament on Friday, May 12 will be in effect from March to October 29.

It “aims to strengthen and consolidate the fight against the insecurity and to give more opportunities and resources” to security forces, Justice Minister Bibata Nebie Ouedraogo said.

The state of emergency gives security forces power to conduct searches of homes, day or night and restricts freedom of movement and assembly.

In mid-April, Burkina Faso’s military junta also declared a “general mobilisation” to combat a string of bloody attacks blamed on jihadists.

Burkina Faso, faced two military coups in 2022, but has bern battling a jihadist insurgency since 2015.

The violence has seen more than 10,000 killed both civilians and military — according to the UN, and displaced some two million people.

Captain Ibrahim Traore, Burkina’s transitional president who staged the most recent coup on September 30, has set a goal of recapturing 40 percent of the country’s territory, currently controlled by jihadists affiliated with Al-Qaeda and ISIS.

Traore said in a statement read on national television on Friday evening that a group of officers, who helped Damiba to seize power in January, had decided to remove their leader due to his inability to deal with worsening Islamist insurgency.

Reuters reported that Damiba had ousted former President Roch Kabore in January, in part for the same reason.

Consequently, the constitution has been suspended and the transitional charter dissolved, borders are closed indefinitely and all political and civil society activities are suspended, Traore said. He also declared a curfew from 9pm to 5am.

Faced with the deteriorating situation, we tried several times to get Damiba to refocus the transition on the security question,” said the statement signed by Traore and read out by another officer on television, flanked by a group of soldiers in military fatigues and heavy armour.

The statement said Damiba had rejected proposals by the officers to reorganise the army and instead continued with the military structure that had led to the fall of the previous regime.

“Damiba’s actions gradually convinced us that his ambitions were diverting away from what we set out to do. We decided this day to remove Damiba,” it said.

He said national stakeholders would be invited soon to adopt a new transitional charter and designate a new civilian or military president.

Applause erupted in the courtroom as the long-awaited verdict was read out, bringing the curtain down on a case that has afflicted the impoverished and volatile state for 34 years.

Compaore, who lived in exile in Ivory Coast after being toppled by public protests in 2014, and Kafando, who had been on the run since 2016, were tried in absentia.

The court also issued life terms to Hyacinthe Kafando, an officer suspected of having led the hit squad, and General Gilbert Diendere, an army commander at the time of the assassination, which coincided with a coup that brought Compaore to power.

The six-month trial was avidly followed by many in the landlocked Sahel nation, for whom Sankara’s bloody death remains a dark blot on the country’s history.

A fiery Marxist-Leninist who blasted the West for neo-colonialism and hypocrisy, Sankara was shot dead on October 15 1987, little more than four years after coming to power as an army captain aged just 33.

He and 12 colleagues were killed by a hit squad at a meeting of the ruling National Revolutionary Council.

Osinbajo will be at the meeting, which is coming as part of the resolutions reached last week’s virtual meeting chaired by Ghana’s President Nana Akufo-Addo

Senior Special Assistant to the Vice President on Media and Publicity, Laolu Akande, disclosed this in a statement he signed on Thursday morning titled ‘President delegates Osinbajo to ECOWAS Extraordinary Summit on political situation in Burkina Faso, Mali & Guinea.’

According to Akande, Thursday’s meeting will “review the report of the ECOWAS delegation dispatched to Ouagadougou to meet with the military junta who recently seized power in Burkina Faso.

“The summit will be attended by regional leaders who will consider imposing additional sanctions after the country was suspended from the regional body last week.”

The bloc’s 15-member Peace and Security Council said on Twitter it had voted “to suspend the participation of #BurkinaFaso in all AU activities until the effective restoration of constitutional order in the country”.

Moussa Faki Mahamat, chair of the African Union Commission, had already condemned the coup the day it happened and before it was clear who was taking charge.

The West African bloc ECOWAS suspended Burkina Faso on Friday and sent a delegation to meet with the ruling junta Saturday.

The coup is the latest bout of turmoil to strike Burkina Faso, a landlocked state that has suffered chronic instability since gaining independence from France in 1960.

A jihadist insurgency that spread over Mali’s border has killed more than 2,000 people and forced 1.5 million to flee their homes since 2015.

Mali and Guinea, also in West Africa, have also seen coups in the past 18 months that have prompted AU suspensions.

Sudan is also suspended following a coup there in October.

The spate of coups is expected to be a major point of discussion at the AU summit in Addis Ababa this weekend, diplomats say.

West Africa’s main regional bloc made the announcement on Friday, January 28, days after mutinous soldiers forced democratically elected President Roch Marc Christian Kabore to resign.

The soldiers also went on state television to announce a military takeover of the country, which they said was under siege from armed groups. The military rulers said Kabore failed to stem the violence that has killed thousands during his time in power.

A delegation of ECOWAS defence chiefs will travel to Burkina Faso’s capital Ouagadougou on Saturday, January 29, followed by a ministerial mission a few days later, the statement said. Heads of ECOWAS member states will reconvene for another summit in Ghana’s capital Accra on Feb. 3 to discuss the findings of the two delegations.

ECOWAS and its international allies have condemned the coup in Burkina Faso, which they fear could further destabilise a country beset by Islamist violence, but find themselves with limited leverage.

The West African leaders met virtually yesterday to discuss the Burkina Faso coup, and a delegation was expected to travel to the Burkinabe capital, Ouagadougou, in the coming days.

Ghanaian president, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, the current ECOWAS chairman, described the recent spate of coups in West Africa as “a direct violation of our democratic tenets. “The rest of the world is looking up to us to be firm on this matter,” he said.

The bloc could still choose to sanction Burkina Faso when members reconvene next week.

On Monday, January 24, Damiba led a coup that ousted President Roch Kaboré. He blamed the president for failing to contain violence by Islamist militants. His move follows moves in other African countries Mali, Guinea and Sudan which have carried out successful coups in recent times.

The coup has been met with swift condemnation by the African Union, ECOWAS  and the United Nations. Wearing a red beret and army fatigues, Lt-Col Damiba on Thursday night, January 27, addressed the country for the first time on national television since taking power. He promised a return to the normal constitutional order “when the conditions are right”.

“When the conditions are right, according to the deadline that our people will define in all sovereignty, I commit to a return to a normal constitutional order,” he said.

Lt-Col Damiba, 41, said he will meet representatives of various sections of society to agree on a roadmap for reform.

He added that Burkina Faso needs international partners “more than ever”, following condemnation of the coup.

“I call on the international community to support our country so it can exit this crisis as soon as possible.”

Former president, Kaboré had faced growing discontent over his failure to stem an Islamist insurgency in the country. Lt-Col Damiba has been at the forefront of the fight against Islamist militants and even wrote a book on the topic last year.

Guinea and Mali have had sanctions imposed on them by regional bloc Ecowas to force them to return to constitutional order.

Ecowas says it will meet on Friday, January 28, to discuss how to respond to Burkina Faso’s latest coup.