Nigeria, June 2 -- West African leaders converged on Lagos on 28 May to commemorate the golden jubilee of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). It was deeply introspective and invariably a compass for the community's trajectory in its efforts towards optimising the region's potential to enhance the living standards of its people, the majority of whom belong to one of the world's worst poverty-stricken belts.

President Bola Tinubu, the current chairman of the ECOWAS Authority of the Heads of State and Government, led the charge. Bilateral talks, back in the day, between Yakubu Gowon, the military head of state of Nigeria, and his Togolese counterpart, Gnassingbe Eyadema, later morphed into a union of 15-member nations on...