Church Leaders from Bishops’ Regional Conference of West Africa to Meet in a Fortnight

CANAA || By Damian Avevor, Ghana || 08 February 2016

Over one hundred and fifty Catholic Church leaders representing the Regional Episcopal Conferences of West Africa (RECOWA-CERAO) are scheduled to come together in Ghana’s capital, Accra, for their second Plenary Assembly in just a fortnight.

The Church leaders who will include Cardinals, Archbishops, Bishops and other office bearers from the various Church institutions in the West African region will come from 15 countries, namely, Benin, Nigeria, Burkina Faso, Togo, Cote d’Ivoire, Guinea, Gambia, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Guinea Bissau, Cape Verde, Senegal and Sierra Leone.

RECOWA is the Catholic Bishops' Regional grouping which brings together Anglophone, Lusophone and Francophone Bishops of West Africa.

The current President of RECOWA-CERAO is His Eminence Theodore Cardinal Adrien Sarr, Archbishop Emeritus of Dakar, Senegal.

The eight- day Conference scheduled to run from February 22 to 29, 2016 will take place at the M-Plaza Hotel in Accra under the theme, The New Evangelization and the Specific Challenges for the Church, Family of God in West Africa: Reconciliation, Development, Family Life.

Various dignitaries have been invited at the opening ceremony to be held on February 23, among them, Ghana’s President John Dramani Mahama, Ghana’s former Presidents Jerry Rawlings and John Kufour, the Apostolic Nuncio in Ghana, the Dean of the Diplomatic Corps, Madam Tendal Musoka, the Ambassadors of West African countries, Representatives from the Christian Council, Office of Chief Imam, Pentecostal Council, Ahmadiyya Muslim Mission, All Catholic MPs, Officers of the Security agencies, among others.

In June 1963, Conference Episcopale Regionale de l’Afrique de l’Ouest (CERAO) was formed to bring together all Francophone and Lusophone Catholic Bishops from West Africa under one regional grouping.

Anglophone Catholic Bishops in West Africa followed suit in 1977 with the formation of a regional body known as the Association of the Episcopal Conferences of Anglophone West Africa (AECAWA).

In the 1990s, the idea was mooted for a union of Anglophone, Francophone and Lusophone Episcopal Conferences so that there could be better understanding, exchange of views, experiences and general pastoral collaboration among all the Episcopal Conferences of West Africa.

Invitations for AECAWA member countries to attend meetings organised by CERAO member countries and vice versa soon became the order of the day.

In December 2000, in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, the Governing Councils of AECAWA and CERAO met for the first time in a Joint Assembly to deliberate on the theme, Building the Church as Family of God in West Africa: Opportunities and Challenges.

Participants at this Joint Assembly decided to form a union which would be a merger of AECAWA and CERAO allowing in the process, an integration of all English-Speaking, Portuguese-speaking and French-speaking Episcopal Conferences in West Africa into one union of Episcopal Conferences to be known as RECOWA-CERAO.

RECOWA-CERAO was officially inaugurated in Abuja, Nigeria in 2007 and the 1st Plenary Assembly took place in Yamoussoukro, Cote d’Ivoire, from January 23- 29, 2012.

Both AECAWA and CERAO ceased to exist from September 1, 2009.

It is now the turn of Ghana to host the 2^nd Plenary Assembly this year in Accra where members of the Ghana Catholic Bishops’ Conference (GCBC) will be fully represented.