The Alliance of States of the Sahel establishes a common customs right

This article was automatically translated from HIBAPRESS, the Arabic version:

Hibapress

Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso, which have left ECOWAS to meet in the Alliance of the States of the Sahel (AES), have set up a common customs right of 0.5% on imports from non -members of their Confederation.

These three Sahelian countries have established “a confederal AES (PC-AES)” sample of the countries who are not members of their Confederation and those with whom they do not have customs agreement, indicates a joint decision, signed by the Malian Head of State and President of AES, General Assimi Goïta.

“The rate of PC-AES is set at 0.5% of the customs value of goods imported from third countries”, specifies the same source, noting that this rate “can be revised by decision of the college of heads of state of the AES Confederation”.

According to the document, the resources generated, through the establishment of this new common customs law, aim to finance particularly the functioning of the organs, the AES projects and programs or any other essential expenditure.

The Malian Minister of Economy and Finance, Alousséni Sanou, stressed that this customs right “is not an additional burden”, recalling that “we had a community levy Cedeao which was of the same rate and which applied to the same basis”.

So for Malian users, “it’s just a transfer of this levy, it does not impact importations at all and that does not impact the cost of the foodstuffs that are imported,” he explained.

In January 2024, the three countries left ECOWAS, accusing it, among other things, of not having helped them enough in the fight against terrorist violence. A decision that took effect a year later, on January 29.