“Ultimately ECOWAS, like ourselves is an organization,
which the member states (…) have decided to put together. So [it] depends on
the resources, the commitment and the political will that member states put
into the common project” (EU, EEAS staff, Brussels).
.
.
The pressure to act on the prevalence of illegal
migrants from West Africa to Europe lead policy makers to locate migration
policy initiatives to the inter-regional level to the EU and the ECOWAS. However,
the enquiry into this recent development reveals that regional actors have been
heavily restricted in initiating migration policies. National member states
passed on the hostile attitudes of voters on labor migration policies and
granted regional actors only a highly limited mandate. Like this, the regional
actors, too, were prevented to initiate a political migration framework in
response to the socio-economic changes.
The
inter-regional cooperation on migration evaded to the area of migration &
development. Interventions were located within the West African region, aiming
at enhancing intra-regional migration. However, such migration policy initiatives
experienced limitations of a similar nature. West African governments showed
reluctance with implementing the free movement of people on the intra-regional
level in the face of their tensed national labor markets. In this regard, the inter-regional
initiatives, which targeted intra-regional migration on the political level
showed as little potential to mitigate the prevailing socio-economic challenges
and illegal migration movements as did the national political initiatives. >>> read Part IV. of I./II./III./IV./V./VI. <<<