MARTIN MAWAYA
MIDRAND, SOURH AFRICA-The Secretary General of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), Wamkele Mene, has warned that Africa’s flagship trade pact risks stalling unless national parliaments expedite legislative processes and address infrastructure gaps that continue to stifle intra trade.
Speaking virtually from Ghana at the 2025 Conference of Speakers of National and Regional Parliaments in Midrand on Monday, Mene said that while the continent had made significant strides in operationalizing the Agreement, progress remains uneven.
“Only 25 State Parties, representing 52 percent of those with adopted offers, have gazzetted their tariff concession schedules. This reflects readiness gaps that could derail the momentum we have built,” he said.
The AfCFTA, which seeks to establish a single market of 1.4 billion people, has already recorded tangible benefits.
By June this year, more than 8 500 AfCFTA certificates of origin had been issued, up from only 13 in 2022, signaling strong uptake by the private sector.
Intra-African trade rebounded to US$220,3 billion in 2024, marking a 12,4 percent increase from the previous year.
However, Mene emphasized that the agreement’s success will not be measured by statistics alone, but by its ability to drive industrialization, create decent jobs, and empower women, youth, and small and medium enterprises.
“Industrialisation cannot take off when trucks are delayed for days at border posts or when digital platforms remain inaccessible to small businesses,” he said. “The AfCFTA must translate into real opportunities for our people.”
He called on parliaments to ratify and domesticate AfCFTA protocols, align trade and investment laws with continental frameworks, and exercise oversight over tariff reductions and trade facilitation measures.
Legislators were also urged to prioritize budgetary allocations for customs modernisation, SME support, youth and women empowerment programmes.
He further noted that while the composition of African trade is beginning to shift from raw commodities towards industrial output such as vehicles, food products and electronics, the continent still lost US$77 billion in potential trade last year due to weak infrastructure and persistent non-tariff barriers.
“The AfCFTA has moved from negotiation to implementation. We cannot afford to lose momentum. Its success will not be measured by the number of protocols signed, but by improvements in the lives of our people,” he said.
The call places renewed responsibility on national legislatures across the continent to accelerate the domestication of the agreement and ensure Africa builds resilience against global economic shocks.
