The new ECOWAS Regional Electricity Regulatory Authority (ERERA) chairman, Mr. Laurent Tossou, has been sworn in during the opening ceremony of ECOWAS council of Energy Ministers in Abuja on Thursday.
ERERA is the regulator of regional cross-border trade of electricity in West Africa with the commitment of Member States to achieve electricity interconnections for the pooling and sharing energy resources in the region.
Speaking shortly after the sworn-in, Tossou restated the commitment of the authority in strengthening electricity market in West Africa region.
He pledged his commitment to the launch of the second phase of the market and establishments of various rules to guide and monitor the market.
The President of Benin, Mr. Patrice Talon, had in June this year, lunched the ECOWAS Regional Electricity Market in Cotonou. The launched include the establishment of appropriate legal and institutional framework for the development of the electricity sector in West Africa.
Tossou said: “There are still a lot more work to be done. We need to establish all the rules in order to monitor the electricity market in ECOWAS, though some rules have been established before now. The Ministers of Energy in ECOWAS had launched the first phase of electricity market in 2018. We are now preparing for the second phase of the market which means that we are going into competition. There are technical, legal, economic and commercial issues that are being look into and the role of ECOWAS ERERA is to establish all the rules and monitor the second phase of electricity market.
“What that means is that ERERA need to establish the rules to monitor the dispute because there could be disputes when in the field of commercial”, he stated Tossou said since all the countries are not at the same level of electricity development, efforts are on to ensure all countries in the region participate in the second phase of electricity market to be launched soon.
TOSSOU, had assumed office in July 2022, following the end of tenure of the second Chairman. He is an engineer by profession.
Mr. Laurent Tossou, joins the two other members of the Regulatory Council composed of Dr. Haliru DIKKO (Economist) and Mr. Aly Mar NDIAYE (Engineer), who assumed office in May 2017.
