The Assembly of Heads of State and Government of the African Union (AU) on Sunday, selected Ghana as the host country for the Secretariat of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).

The decision was announced on Sudan at the 12th AU Extraordinary Summit held in Niamey, Niger, after Ghana beat off competition from countries including Egypt, Ethiopia, Kenya, Madagascar and Senegal.

The core mandate of the secretariat will be to implement the AfCFTA Agreement, which has since been ratified by 25 member states of the AU.

The AfCFTA is a trade agreement among 49 AU member states, with the goal of creating a single market, followed by the free movement of people and a single-currency union. The AfCFTA was signed in Kigali, Rwanda, on March 21, 2018.

A statement from the Jubilee House yesterday said during the closing session of the summit, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo thanked the assembly for the decision, stating that “it is a privilege that, for the first time in our nation’s history, we have the responsibility of hosting an important pan-African institution”.