Checkpoints are the bane of the transport industry in West Africa – delaying the movement of vehicles carrying goods and people and frustrating drivers, passengers and traders with unscrupulous officers seeking “something to eat.”

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Five years after USAID and UEMOA, with support from ECOWAS, launched an initiative to monitor and report on the problem, improvements have been slow coming. But come they have, stakeholders agreed during the initiative’s annual steering committee meeting in Lome, Togo, in September. 

Bribes and delays have dropped – by 36% and 17%, respectively – on the three corridors where the road governance initiative started in 2006. Quarterly reports have reflected the improvements, bit by bit.

Meanwhile, monitoring on the Abidjan-Lagos corridor, the busiest trade route in the region, has seen similar improvements. The Abidjan-Lagos Corridor Organization (ALCO) supported by the World Bank and ECOWAS, which collects data on delays and bribes on that stretch, has measured an intense concentration of checkpoints between Lagos and the Benin border – with one checkpoint on average every four kilometers, it may be the most densely checked route in the world. 

“Today everyone recognizes the extent of the problem,” said Dr. Justin Koffi, the ALCO Executive Secretary. “Now, thanks to the monitoring and reporting efforts, many more people are acting. It is in that context that ALCO and Trade Hub are collaborating closely to address the issues of delays and harassments at the borders and on the roads.”

The reporting has led to a change in addressing the problem. First, the scope has broadened: The number of countries with corridors being monitored has since doubled. More importantly, dissemination and advocacy has grown more emphatic and sophisticated: The Borderless advocacy campaign launched last March 2010 has recently been complemented by a private sector led Borderless Alliance to turn inspiration into action.

“Senegal became a part of the road governance initiative in 2009,” noted Drame Seck, director of road transport in the Ministry of Transport. “The dysfunctional practices related to the numerous checkpoints – delays and bribes – are being addressed.”

“The Borderless campaign allowed people to denounce the practices that had been persisting for a long time,” said Gerard Delanne, secretary general of Niger’s Union of Merchandise Transporters. 

It was a common refrain during the meeting in the Togolese capital. The last year has seen new initiatives bear fruit – caravans in Ghana and Togo led to sustained declines in harassment, stakeholders said – but the primary focus was on the evolution of the initiative: Stakeholders agreed on establish a West Africa Transport Observatory, which would expand the monitoring initiative to study virtually all aspects affecting the costs of moving goods and vehicles across the region.

“Certainly, such an observatory will improve regional trade by taking into account the transporters and the ports, too,” said Seydou Traore of the Malian Shippers’ Council.

Milestones reached

The launch of the Borderless initiative in March 2010, which was carried forward by a variety of awareness raising activities led by civil society organizations in five countries, was a milestone for reducing checkpoints, delays and bribes, stakeholders agreed.

The campaign established common ground for activities from Senegal all the way to Togo – and the involvement of key partners at the Abidjan-Lagos Corridor Organization, the USAID ATP/E-ATP projects in Ghana, and leading private sector transport and logistics companies, gave the message greater reach.

“The concept of Borderless has been widely accepted and is a part of many discussions with authorities,” said Seck of Senegal. “The principal goal of all of the UEMOA and ECOWAS regulatory protocols related to trade, transport and trade facilitation is trade without borders in West Africa.”

In May, the prime ministers of Mali and Senegal met under the Borderless banner to discuss trade between their countries. Ghana’s Minister of Trade and other government officials across the region have also participated in the campaign.

Data collection activities strengthened

In a one-day workshop prior to the steering committee meeting, the USAID Trade Hub trained data collection agents from each country along the corridors that identify and assist truck drivers in filling out surveys that serve as the basis for the reports. The truck drivers voluntarily indicate on the forms every checkpoint where they encounter delays and/or harassment for bribes.