Expert SpeakRaisina Debates
Published on Jul 16, 2026
From Guinea to Mali, ECOWAS’s inconsistent response to unconstitutional power grabs has fuelled the rise of the anti-Western AES — and left West Africa‘s political future increasingly uncertain
On 7 December 2025, eight soldiers appeared on screens across Benin to announce the fall of the sitting president, Patrice Talon, and a successful military coup d’état. Rather than following the now-established pattern of successful military coups in the region, however, Talon’s government was swift in its retribution, and only hours later, Interior Minister Alassane Seidou publicly announced the coup’s failure.
The <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2025/12/16/has-benins-foiled-coup-made-ecowas-a-west-african-heavyweight-once-more” rel=”nofollow noopener” target=”_blank”>2025 Beninese coup attempt was foiled in part due to the actions of the ECOWAS Standby Force (ESF), a standby military force operated by the Economic Community of West African States. ECOWAS is a regional economic and political coalition composed of 12 sovereign states in West Africa. Even after its recent success in Benin, ECOWAS faces threats from a combination of regional and international forces — pressures with the potential to seriously destabilise both West African inter-state cohesion and the established international powers active in the region. This creates the potential for a significant shift in regional and global power dynamics, which merits closer analysis of current trends in West African politics to understand the possible repercussions for both regional and international communities
Since 2020, there have been six successfulcoups across West Africa. Historically, West Africa has been the most politically turbulent region in Africa, accounting for 51 percent of all coups and coup attempts on the continent over the six decades since independence. Though the late 1990s and early 2000s saw a steady decline in the rate of coups d’état, 2020 marked the beginning of a resurgence in violent political turnover across the region. Because of the ESF’s success, Benin could mark a turning point for the region. The 2025 Benin coup attempt is far from the first in an ECOWAS state, especially in recent years, but the ESF had not intervened so directly until now.
The return to political instability in West Africa has been largely centred on the Sahel region, beginning with the military takeover led by Assimi Goïta in Mali, followed shortly by Ibrahim Traoré’s coup in Burkina Faso in 2022, and then Niger, where Abdourahamane Tchiani led a coup d’état in 2023. Rather than deploying the ESF, ECOWAS responded to the changes in leadership by suspending the three nations from the bloc and imposing sanctions to pressure the military governments into reinstating democratic rule. These sanctions backfired: rather than submitting to international demands, Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso announced their immediate withdrawal from ECOWAS in 2024. The three states then formed their own interstate alliance, l’Alliance des États du Sahel (AES), or the Alliance of Sahel States. This split from ECOWAS undermined the coalition’s place as the established regional hegemon, signalling a significant shift in regional power dynamics
ECOWAS and Maintenance of Good Governance
ECOWAS serves West Africa in several ways, including its commitment to maintaining political security and good governance in a historically volatile region. To uphold these principles, ECOWAS has employed a range of measures, including military intervention and the imposition of political sanctions on member states or governments that depart from democratic norms. One such intervention was the now-defunct ECOWAS Monitoring Group (ECOMOG), which was deployed in several conflicts across the region during the 1990s and early 2000s, often alongside United Nations peacekeeping operations such as the United Nations Mission in Liberia. ECOMOG faced intense criticism, with detractors citing alleged human rights violations and operational ineffectiveness. The ECOWAS Standby Force (ESF) has also been deployed to restore democratic order in response to attempted coups. During the 2017 Gambian election, incumbent President Yahya Jammeh refused to concede defeat, but the ESF’s swift intervention helped ensure a peaceful transfer of power.
Though sanctions are ECOWAS’s go-to response to coup governments, they have been criticised for their ineffectiveness. The negative effects of sanctions are borne largely by the citizenry, not the elites, and often only increase political unrest.
Though ECOWAS has used military intervention at times, its primary response to violations of its protocol on good governance is political and economic sanctions. These measures include suspension of the state from ECOWAS membership, travel bans on state leadership, economic blockades, and arms embargoes. Though sanctions are ECOWAS’s go-to response to coup governments, they have been criticised for their ineffectiveness. The negative effects of sanctions are borne largely by the citizenry, not the elites, and often only increase political unrest.The overwhelming majority of states sanctioned by ECOWAS do not respond favourably to its demands, suggesting that ECOWAS’s primary response to coup governments may need to be reevaluated.
In the wake of a coup d’état, ECOWAS has historically responded forcefully, through military intervention, sanctions and other political consequences. Military coups d’état are not, however, the only type of coup present in West Africa. Constitutional coups are equally dangerous but are rarely treated with the same severity by ECOWAS. A constitutional coup occurs when a sitting elected leader alters their nation’s constitution or other regulatory laws to retain power. Constitutional coups are a repeated problem within ECOWAS member states: former Guinean President Alpha Condé claimed a third term in 2020 after altering the nation’s constitution to allow him to run. ECOWAS was fully supportive of his victory — unsurprising, given that several other member states are themselves led by leaders who have used similarly unconstitutional means to extend their rule, including Ivorian President Alassane Ouattara and Togolese President Faure Gnassingbé.
ECOWAS recently reinstated Guinea-Conakry as a full member, following its suspension after the 2021 coup that deposed former president Alpha Condé. ECOWAS sanctions were lifted after the re-establishment of a constitutional government and the election of Mamady Doumbouya as president. This could be seen as evidence of the effectiveness of ECOWAS sanctions, but Doumbouya is not simply the newly elected president: he was also the leader of the coup d’état that deposed Condé, and served as interim president of the military junta that had controlled the country since 2021. Doumbouya won the presidency with 87 percent of the vote and was immediately accused of election tampering. Rather than evidence of the effectiveness of ECOWAS’s actions, Guinea’s reintroduction to the organisation highlights a serious issue with the standard of good governance upheld by its own members.
The AES Alternative
The establishment of the AES introduced a new political tension within West Africa. Almost immediately following their withdrawal from ECOWAS, the AES states also announced the near-complete withdrawal of Western, primarily French, troops from their nations. All three AES member states are former French colonies and have maintained a significant French military presence since independence. One of the tenets of AES’s international policy is its rejection of Western, particularly French, influence and interference
vacuum that the numerous jihadist terror groups active in the region were well placed to exploit. The AES lacked the domestic military resources to combat this threat effectively, and the Sahel saw a massive increase in the presence of paramilitary mercenary groups such as the Wagner Group, an organisation with ties to the Kremlin. The Wagner Group, among other mercenary groups with international ties to states such as Russia, China, Iran, and Türkiye, has been accused of aiding Goïta in his 2021 coup. The presence of these international actors signals, once again, that the AES has allied itself with several explicitly anti-Western powers. Coupled with other international interventions, such as China’s Belt and Road Initiative, it is becoming evident that non-Western powers are making concerted and deliberate attempts to alter the existing dynamics of international power by building support from organisations like the AES.
In the last two years, the AES has repeatedly and definitively rejected Western influence and international organisations. It withdrew from the International Criminal Court (ICC) in September 2025, citing the ICC’s failure to prosecute war criminals and accusing the court of acting as ‘an instrument of neo-colonial repression.’ The AES has continued to distance itself from Western-reliant international systems. ECOWAS, on the other hand, has continued to build its alliance with Western powers. As French influence in the Sahel has waned, France has begun investing heavily in other West African states, such as Nigeria, which have welcomed French interest.
AES and the Future of West Africa
The existence of the AES alone does not pose a significant threat to ECOWAS’s ability to maintain regional leadership; it does signal a major shift in the dynamics of political security within the region. Regardless of how these governments seized power, the AES’s anti-Western messaging is becoming increasingly popular, especially in former French colonies across the region. A November 2024 survey by Afrobarometer indicated that 54 percent of Togolese citizens favoured leaving ECOWAS and joining the AES. This, coupled with the Togolese government’s expressed goal of building a stronger relationship with the AES, could signal a regional shift in state priorities and a growing regional power imbalance.
The existence of the AES alone does not pose a significant threat to ECOWAS’s ability to maintain regional leadership; it does signal a major shift in the dynamics of political security within the region.
Should more states follow Togo’s example, ECOWAS could experience a decline in influence, while the AES continues to grow. The future of West Africa is uncertain, but it is becoming increasingly evident that the region could become one of the next major battlegrounds between international powers. The AES’s rise is itself a contradiction worth noting: it is an interstate bloc that categorically rejects Western interference and international collaboration, yet relies heavily on non-Western powers such as Russia and China for its own security and development. Should this model take hold more broadly, it could fundamentally alter global security dynamics and weaken the wider international cohesion that has long been underpinned by Western-led institutions.
Kennedy Grahamis a Research Intern at the Observer Research Foundation.
The views expressed above belong to the author(s). ORF research and analyses now available on Telegram! Click here to access our curated content — blogs, longforms and interviews.
Author
Kennedy Graham
Kennedy Graham is a Research Intern at the Observer Research Foundation. …
Related Search Terms
Publications
A Tale of Two Standards: ECOWAS and West Africa’s Governance Crisis
International Affairs
Jul 16, 2026
