NYAGA: EAC expansion has killed the bloc

The EAC was meant to be a political union, not just a trading bloc. That requires compatible governance systems, mutual trust and genuine sovereignty pooling. By prioritising size over compatibility, the community has eroded these foundations for integration. The haphazard expansion has killed the very dream it purports to advance.

Vision of a political union

In the 1960s, the federation dream was so strong that then President Julius Nyerere was ready to delay Tanganyika’s independence in order to become independent together with Kenya and Uganda as a federation. When the three re-established the bloc in 1999, they revived this dream, forming a committee in 2004 to fast-track the federation.

Fast forward to 2025, the integration agenda is collapsing. Members are engaged in open political and trade conflicts, with Uganda threatening future wars over sea access. The Rwanda-Burundi and Rwanda-DRC borders remain closed despite commitments to common market and free movement. The monetary union, targeting a single currency by 2031, has completely stalled, as members cannot agree on foundational laws and institutions. Institutional weaknesses and chronic underfunding cripple the community.

Never since 1977 has Jumuiya’s future been so bleak. The EAC is effectively dead, a reality slowly sinking in across national capitals.

So where did the rain start beating us? The answer lies in the recent expansion spree, which admitted new incompatible members with no capacity to meet basic obligations.

Standards abandoned

EAC membership requires a market-driven economy, good governance and the rule of law. These standards have been systematically sacrificed.

South Sudan joined while embroiled in an ethnic conflict. The DRC was admitted despite warfare in its Eastern provinces and a proxy conflict with Rwanda. Somalia joined while engulfed in a civil war, battling al Shabaab, lacking control over significant parts of its territory and facing a resurgence of piracy.

The justification, that large populations equal large markets, is misguided. A functioning common market requires infrastructure, stability and rule of law. These new members are fragile and cannot guarantee the security and institutional capacity for deeper integration.

The absurdity of the expansion further becomes clear when you follow geographical proximity as membership criterion. If Ethiopia and Djibouti join, would Mozambique, Central African Republic and Angola follow? And then South Africa, Cameroon and Chad? If every neighbour of a neighbour qualifies, we might as well rename ourselves the African Union and call it a day.

Financial death spiral, institutional paralysis

Nothing illustrates the expansion’s folly more than the chronic underfunding. DRC and South Sudan have contributed virtually nothing since joining, despite enjoying full privileges, a direct consequence of expansion without capacity assessment. Consequently, the community has ceased functioning. The secretariat has sent home key technical staff, while the legislative assembly and the Court of Justice have been adjourned indefinitely.

The bloc is trapped with members who neither contribute nor comply or voluntarily leave, and yet no one enforces sanctions foreseen in the treaty.

Consolidation, not expansion

The EAC must stop expanding and consolidate. Sanctions should be imposed on members who fail to meet obligations or systematically violate the treaty. Voting rights of members two years in arrears should be suspended until dues are paid.

To break paralysis in decision-making, the community should consider moving from unanimity to qualified majority voting, where key decisions pass by a specified majority. Those who have invested most should not be held hostage by those who contribute nothing and comply with nothing.

The community should also impose a moratorium on new admissions until it consolidates integration among existing members.

EAC must also accept that not all members are on the same path. Leaders must make a fundamental distinction between an East African economic community and an East African political union.

Some members have demonstrated consistent commitment, institutional capacity and political will to pursue deeper integration including a political union. They should be free to do so without waiting for those lacking capacity or interest, while maintaining the broader community for economic cooperation. This is the meaning of variable geometry provided for in the EAC Treaty.

The choice

The EAC faces an existential choice to consolidate into a genuinely integrated union or collapse slowly as a sprawling association in name only. Its future will not be secured by adding more flags to a map, but by restoring the trust, convergence and institutional capacity that expansion has eroded. It needs fewer members doing more, not more members doing nothing.