Twenty-five countries spanning half of Africa have agreed to abolish visa for their business travellers and some other professionals in what could potentially be a major relaxation of migration rules.

The plans were announced in the small West African country of Benin at the closing ceremony on Wednesday of the 25-nation Community of Sahel-Saharan States (CENSAD).  The bloc’s members stretch from Morocco, Libya and Egypt on the Mediterranean coast to Central African Republic in the south and Somalia and the Comoros islands in the east.  “Visas are abolished for businessmen, researchers, sportspeople and well-known artists,” a final declaration said at the end of a two-day summit in Benin’s main city Cotonou.  The declaration also said member states would promote agricultural development and cooperation between oil importers and exporters to help people cope with food and fuel inflation, but it gave few details.  The 15 states of West Africa’s ECOWAS bloc, all but one of which is CEN-SAD members, have already started a scheme of a common passport and travel without visas within their zone.

But many travellers complain that despite having the right to travel freely in the region, they regularly suffer harassment or extortion as foreigners, particularly at security checkpoints regularly set up on roads around West Africa.

Last month tiny Guinea-Bissau – which is home to an estimated 150 000 foreigners, one in 10 of the population - told immigrantsto register with the authorities or risk being kicked out of the country.

But authorities relented after the head of the ECOWAS Commission on the Free Movement of Goods and Persons, himself a member of Guinea-Bissau’s parliament, said

ECOWAS citizens had the same rights asnationals of the country, officials in the capital Bisau