The following is an opinion piece submitted by Emmanuel Frimpong, Tourism Consultant, President of the Africa Tourism Research Network (ATRN), Vice President of the Africa Medical Tourism Council, and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Pishon Consult. The views expressed are his own. Factual claims have been independently verified by NewsGhana.
Two months into 2026, West Africans are still paying some of the highest airfares in the world. That is not an opinion. It is a fact, and it is a fact that demands an explanation from ECOWAS.
In December 2024, the ECOWAS Authority of Heads of State and Government adopted a landmark Supplementary Act on Aviation Charges, Taxes and Fees at their Abuja Summit. From January 1, 2026, all ECOWAS member states committed to abolishing air transport taxes and reducing passenger and security charges by 25 percent. The decision was celebrated across the aviation industry, by airlines, tourism operators, investors, and millions of ordinary travellers who had long suffered under a system where, as ECOWAS Commission Director of Transport Chris Appiah confirmed, up to 70 percent of a typical West African airline ticket consists of taxes and charges rather than the cost of flying itself.
That figure is not an anomaly. Aviation charges in West Africa are up to 67 percent higher than in any other African region, which is why carriers like Ethiopian Airlines, South African Airways, and Royal Air Maroc thrive while West African airlines struggle. A trader moving goods between Lagos and Dakar cannot pay less than $3,000 in airfares alone, much of it pure taxation.
Yet two months after the January 1 deadline, the evidence on the ground tells a different story from the one promised in Abuja. Member states have not fully transposed the ECOWAS decision into national regulatory frameworks, preventing airlines from adjusting fares. Paradoxically, some states have raised or introduced new charges since the announcement: Ghana increased immigration data processing fees by $9 from February 1, and Nigeria raised similar fees by $11.50 from December 2025. The Agency for the Safety of Air Navigation in Africa and Madagascar, known as ASECNA, simultaneously announced a 15 percent increase in en-route navigation service charges, phased in at 5 percent per year beginning January 1, 2026.
This is not a technicality. It is a credibility test, and ECOWAS is currently failing it.
The bloc made a bold and public commitment with a specific implementation date. January came and went. February came and went. We are now in March. The taxes that the Supplementary Act was supposed to abolish remain embedded in ticket prices across the region. No member state has issued a public implementation report. No compliance rankings have been published. The Regional Air Transport Economic Oversight Mechanism, which the ECOWAS Commission said would monitor implementation, has issued no visible public findings.
ECOWAS must understand what is at stake here, and it goes beyond aviation. Projections in the Supplementary Act suggest ticket prices could drop by up to 40 percent once the policy takes full effect, stimulating tourism, business travel, trade, and broader economic activity. West Africa’s contribution to the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) depends heavily on the affordable movement of people and goods. Every month that this reform exists only on paper is a month of foregone jobs, foregone investment, and foregone integration.
The fix is not complicated, but it requires honesty. If member states are resisting, ECOWAS must say so publicly and name them. If the Supplementary Act requires parallel national legislation before it can take effect, ECOWAS must publish a status tracker and a timeline for each of its 12 member states. If fiscal constraints are slowing compliance, the Commission should outline its resource mobilisation plan, including the technical assistance it has promised to provide. Silence is not a neutral position. In the context of a missed deadline, silence is a statement of failure.
ECOWAS can still redeem this commitment. The window is open. But it is not open indefinitely. Every week that West African travellers continue paying the same inflated fares after a formal regional commitment to reduce them, the credibility cost compounds.
West Africans are watching. The aviation and tourism industries are waiting. The time for silence is over.
Emmanuel Frimpong is a Tourism Consultant, Analyst, President of the Africa Tourism Research Network, Vice President of the Africa Medical Tourism Council, and CEO of Pishon Consult. He can be reached at [email protected] or +233 261 128 507.
