Burundese Ezechiel Nibigira Appoints Commission Chair at 7th ECCAS Extraordinary Summit 2025
The 7th Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS) Summit took place at the Sipopo International Convention Center in Equatorial Guinea, on 7 September 2025. Sipopo is a town in the Bioko island which is located some 15 kilometers from the capital Malabo.
On 5 September 2025, the Council of Ministers of #ECCAS first convened in preparation for the Summit with the Heads of State. The ECCAS received 133 applications for the post of the new Chair of the ECCAS Commission. At the end of deliberations, it was decided to recommend Ezechiel Nibigira to the Summit for ratification.
The main item on the agenda was the transfer of baton of the ECCAS Commission from Cap Verde ambassador Gilberto Verissimo to the Burundi ambassador Ezechiel Nibigira. Also, the HQ of the #ECCAS Commission will return Libreville, Gabon for the duration of the mandate of five years, after a temporary move to Malabo in September 2023.
ECCAS salutes the efforts by Lome, Doha and Washington to bring lasting peace in the border region between the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Rwanda. The Heads of States of ECCAS called for the implementation of the United Nations Security Council Resolution 2773 of February 2025 (#UNSC2773) as the basis for peace and security.
In the fight against #ClimateChange, ECCAS deplored the ‘tergiversations’ of certain parties in the face of the urgency of the climate crisis. ECCAS has set up a Regional Hub for Transparency on Climatic Action (#HuRTAC) and will share the perspective of ECCAS along with other Regional Economic Communities (REC) during the 2nd Africa Climate Summit (#ACS2025) in Addis, due to start on 8 September 2025.
The 7th Extraordinary Summit follows the 26th Ordinary ECCAS Summit that took place in Malabo in June 2025. At that time, Rwanda took the decision to withdraw from the ECCAS, as it considers that its turn to the rotating presidency of the #REC has been improperly impeded, with the extension of the chairship of Equatorial Guinea.