Regional Economic Communities, or “RECs” are a peculiarity and a feature of the African economic integration model. Some of them were existing already before the establishment of the Organization for the African Unity (OAU), the predecessor of the African Union, like in the case of SACU, a customs union that is considered the ancient in the world, or the Council of Understanding (Conseil de l’Entente), a West African regional co-operation forum created in May 1959 by Cote d’Ivoire, Niger, Upper Volta (now Burkina Faso) and Dahomey (now Benin), and subsequently joined by Togo in 1966. The Treaty of Abuja (1991) at art. 2.a introduced the principle of the strengthening of existing RECs and of their creation in the various sub-regions where they did not exist, defining them as foundation (“building blocks”) of the future African Economic Community (article 88). The role of RECs as building blocks of the African integration process is also reiterated in the last recital of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement and by art. 5, which defines them as building blocks of the AfCFTA.