Governors of central banks in West Africa reaffirms their commitment to rolling out single currency by 2020

The First Deputy Governor of the Bank of Ghana, Dr Maxwell Opoku Afari made the assurance on behalf of his colleagues.

According to him, the partnership between the West African monetary zone and leaders of the member states has brought intense pressure on the technical committee to meet the 2020 deadline.

He was speaking at the SWIFT African regional conference held in Accra and was themed “enabling the digital economy.”

Dr Opoku Afari disclosed that all bottlenecks are being worked on by member states and central bank governors to ensure that the 2020 deadline for implementing the common currency is not extended.

“Achieving a common currency is not only technical, but we need a strong political will and in fact, the political players are even putting pressure on the technical team to ensure that we meet the 2020 deadline. We now have heads of states demonstrating a big political will to support these processes,” he noted.

He added that “There are two components thus the technical aspects and being able to work to harmonise our economy which is what we're working on at the moment. For example, the financial systems, supervision and even the convergence criteria which are countries are working to meet and among others.”

Background

The Economic Community of West African State (ECOWAS) revealed that it is ready to roll out a single currency for states that within the union.

The economic union said it has adopted a revised roadmap for accelerating the use of the common currency by 2020.

The Presidential Taskforce on ECOWAS Single Currency Programme made the revelation at Accra, Ghana, on Wednesday, March 13, 2019 whiles they had their 5th meeting.

The Taskforce re-affirmed the political will to meet the deadline by 2020.

The common currency for West African countries is expected to boost intra African trade as well as ensuring inclusive financial growth for the West African zone.