The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) is to set up an early warning centre in Ghana by the end of this year, Foreign Minister Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey has announced.
The early warning centre, the Foreign Minister says, will help deal with security issues across member states of ECOWAS in the long and short term.
“What the centre does is to look at all sectors of member states in terms of security issues and also look at what will bring peace during elections,” Ms Botchwey told Kofi Abotsi during an interview for Asaase Radio’s Town Hall Talk.
The interview centred on terrorism, COVID-19 and border fluidity and diplomacy in the face of the coronavirus outbreak.
Security linchpin
“I think one thing that ECOWAS is doing that is modern in terms of looking at conflict and how to predict conflict is what we call the early warning centres being set up in parts of the continent,” she said.
In May this year the government inaugurated a ten-member task force to draw up modalities and facilitate the establishment of a National Early Warning Centre in Ghana.
Among the duties of the centre is to warn governments of threats to human security, propose appropriate action, and co-ordinate and ensure monitoring of the implementation of security efforts by ECOWAS member states.
Top marks
Answering questions about how well the government has handled the coronavirus, Ms Botchwey said it has done a fine job of managing the situation.
“First of all, let me say that in the first three months all activities came to a halt [as we felt] our way through it, leading to the closure of our missions.
“I am a member of the COVID task force and I can tell you the effort being put in to contain the situation. I will grade government 85%,” she said.
Fred Dzakpata
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