Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger have established a joint regulatory body to coordinate electronic communications and postal regulation across the Alliance of Sahel States (AES), with frequency management among its areas of cooperation.
The three national regulators — Burkina Faso’s ARCEP, Mali’s AMRTP and Niger’s ARCEP — signed the cooperation convention on 25 September 2026 in Ouagadougou, creating the Conseil des Régulateurs du Sahel (CRS) as a permanent framework for coordination. The ceremony was held in the presence of Burkina Faso’s Minister for Digital Transition, Posts and Electronic Communications, Aminata Zerbo/Sabane.
The CRS will facilitate information sharing, joint initiatives and greater coordination between the three regulators. Its areas of cooperation include community roaming, cybersecurity, consumer protection, infrastructure development, emerging technologies and the recognition of approved equipment.
Frequency management and control are also specifically included in the agreement. For broadcasters, this is the element likely to attract the closest attention, as greater coordination across the three-country bloc could have implications for terrestrial transmission planning and spectrum use.
The agreement is centred on electronic communications and postal regulation rather than audiovisual broadcasting, meaning the CRS does not replace the existing broadcast regulators in the three countries. Its potential impact on broadcasting will therefore depend largely on how the new body approaches spectrum coordination and how its work interacts with national audiovisual authorities.
The creation of the CRS also forms part of a broader effort to harmonise regulatory approaches across the AES, including coordinated positions in international forums and cooperation on cross-border communications infrastructure.
For the broadcast industry, the immediate development to watch will be whether the council’s frequency-management work moves beyond telecoms coordination into practical spectrum planning affecting terrestrial television and radio services.
