Sierra Leone’s Ministry of Justice opened a high-stakes legal training exercise in Freetown on Monday, bringing together government officials, legal practitioners, customs authorities, and regulatory agencies to prepare the country for one of the most consequential yet least understood mechanisms in the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) the system through which one African state can take another to account over trade violations.
The Capacity Building Training on the AfCFTA Dispute Settlement Protocol Mechanism, held at the Radisson Blu Hotel, was opened by Deputy Minister of Justice Madam Saptieu Elizabeth Saccoh, who delivered remarks on behalf of Attorney General and Minister of Justice Alpha Sesay. Her address went beyond the usual diplomatic affirmations of continental solidarity, offering a frank account of the legal and institutional demands the dispute settlement framework places on a country like Sierra Leone and of how much ground remains to be covered before those demands can be met in earnest.
Article 20 of the AfCFTA Agreement establishes the Dispute Settlement Mechanism as the legal framework through which state parties may seek to resolve disputes arising under the agreement. The mechanism comprises a Dispute Settlement Body, Adjudicating Panels, and an Appellate Body. The dispute settlement process involves consultation for amicable resolution as a first step, followed by the establishment of an adjudicating panel if no resolution is reached. The panel’s report is submitted to the Dispute Settlement Body for adoption, and its decisions are final and binding. Remedies include recommendations for conformity and the possibility of compensation or suspension of obligations for non-compliance.
A key feature of the process and one with direct implications for Sierra Leonean businesses is that, similar to the World Trade Organization’s approach, recourse is only available to member states, as opposed to citizens or nationals of those states. This is the structural reality that Madam Saccoh placed at the centre of her remarks: because Sierra Leonean exporters, importers, and private sector actors cannot themselves file complaints before the Dispute Settlement Body, the weight of advocacy and legal action falls on the state. That means the Office of the Attorney General and Ministry of Justice must be equipped not only to defend the country against trade complaints, but to proactively assess when to press Sierra Leone’s trade rights on behalf of its private sector.
For small and medium-sized enterprises, the value of the AfCFTA system depends entirely on whether its rules can be enforced in a predictable and accessible way. Disputes are handled between governments, but the consequences land on smaller firms with limited room to absorb delays or added costs.
Sierra Leone’s formal engagement with the AfCFTA predates the agreement’s entry into force. The country ratified in April 2019, helping trigger the agreement’s activation on 30 May 2019. It subsequently distinguished itself as the first African country to gazette its national tariff concession schedule and complete its AfCFTA Readiness Assessment markers that Madam Saccoh cited as evidence of consistent national commitment to continental trade integration.
But formal commitment and operational preparedness are different things, and the convening of a basic capacity building training on the dispute settlement mechanism in 2026 seven years after ratification is itself an implicit acknowledgement of the distance between the two.
As of February 2026, 49 of the 54 AfCFTA signatories have deposited instruments of ratification, and an AU Committee on Implementation was inaugurated in Accra in February 2026, chaired by Kenya’s President William Ruto, to provide political leadership aimed at accelerating the transition from negotiations to full implementation. Negotiations on rules of origin have been completed and approved by the AU Assembly, while tariff offers remain ongoing. The continental architecture is advancing; the question is whether Sierra Leone’s legal institutions will be positioned to use it.
UNCTAD has specifically recommended that African states establish capacity-building institutions to provide advisory and legal services under the AfCFTA, noting that an advisory centre on AfCFTA law analogous to the Advisory Centre on WTO Law would play an essential role in providing training and policy guidance for state parties, particularly those with financial constraints.
The stakes are not abstract. The AfCFTA dispute settlement mechanism, though modelled on the WTO’s Dispute Settlement Understanding, is designed to develop a unique jurisprudence and legal acquis for the continent. Whether African states will actively use the mechanism rather than settling differences through informal consultations or allowing for derogations remains an open question. But when disputes do arise, states without trained legal teams, established inter-institutional coordination, and clear protocols for assessing the legal merits of trade complaints will find themselves at a structural disadvantage.
The AfCFTA aims to create a single continental market with a combined GDP of approximately US$ 3.4 trillion, and projections suggest it could boost income by up to US$ 450 billion by 2035. For Sierra Leone, a country still rebuilding the institutional architecture of its post-conflict economy, the ability to claim its fair share of those gains will depend substantially on the quality of the legal expertise it deploys in trade negotiations and, where necessary, in dispute proceedings.
Madam Saccoh urged participants to engage seriously with the training and carry its lessons back to their institutions emphasising the importance of cross-agency collaboration between the Ministry of Justice, customs authorities, regulatory bodies, legal practitioners, and the private sector as the foundational requirement for effective AfCFTA participation.
Monday’s opening at the Radisson Blu Hotel is unlikely, on its own, to resolve the capacity gaps that make trade dispute readiness elusive for many smaller African economies. Affordable dispute settlement, achievable through mechanisms including digitised processes and online dispute resolution, is central to making the AfCFTA’s promise accessible to states with financial constraints, reducing both financial and political costs of state-to-state litigation. The road from a capacity-building workshop to a fully functional legal team capable of winning or defending a complex trade dispute is long.
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But the convening itself is meaningful. It signals that within Sierra Leone’s Ministry of Justice, there is institutional recognition that AfCFTA participation is not a diplomatic posture to be managed at the level of signature and ratification, but a legal and technical project requiring lawyers, analysts, and institutions that understand the rules of the game and are prepared to play.
