Africa’s six island nations are distributed between the Indian and Atlantic Oceans. The Indian Ocean hosts the diversely populated islands of Comoros, Madagascar, Mauritius and The Seychelles, while Cape Verde and Sao Tome and Principe lie on the Atlantic, off Africa’s west coast.
Given that much of Africa’s development co-operation agenda is conceptualised and undertaken in regions, island nations usually commit to membership of their closest regional economic community (REC). Thus Comoros, Madagascar, Mauritius and The Seychelles are members of SADC while Cape Verde is an ECOWAS member state and the island of Sao Tome and Principe is found in ECCAS.[1]
While African island states can leverage the leniency principles of integration such as variable geometry in implementing REC programmes, they have found certain other provisions lacking in the latitude needed for effective participation by island states. Yet limitations can create opportunities and this presentation provides an overview of Africa’s Island states in the context of their connectedness to African integration. The presentation serves as a precursor to a panel discussion by researchers from the Centre for Comparative Law in Africa (CCLA) at the University of Cape Town on the proposed theme: Regional Integration and Africa’s Islands: Leveraging the Leniency, Latitude and Limitations of the Law.
The proposed panel is comprised of the following speakers and provisional topics:
Prof Ada Ordor: Overview of Africa’s Island Nations
Dr Victor Amadi: Victor: Movement of People and Sustainability of Africa’s Island States.
Dr Julieth Gudo: Climate Change and Human Rights in Africa’s Island States.
Raisa Nyirongo: Regional Courts - Seeking Justice on the Mainland.
Yakubu Nagu: Yakubu: Implementing the AfCFTA in Island Nations.
[1] ECCAS – Economic Community of Central African States; ECOWAS – Economic Community of West African States; SADC – Southern African Development Community.