President John Dramani Mahama has been appointed as co-chair of the ECOWAS mediation team in The Gambia.

He will, together with Nigerian president Muhammadu Buhari – who is the mediator – chair the team of West African leaders, who met in Nigeria to discuss ways of convincing Gambian president Yahya Jammeh to step down after he lost this year’s election, organised on December 1, to Adama Barrow.

Mr Jammeh initially conceded defeat to Mr Barrow but changed his mind and has called for a fresh poll.

Earlier, the leaders of Nigeria, Ghana, Liberia and Sierra Leone failed to convince Mr Jammeh to relinquish power.

Meanwhile, the ECOWAS authority has commended Mr Mahama for his show of statesmanship in conceding defeat in Ghana’s December 7 polls.

Mr Mahama called opposition leader Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to congratulate him as winner of the election organised on 7 December.

In his farewell message to his colleague heads of state, Mr Mahama thanked ECOWAS for its role in the successful conduct of the election in Ghana and “the observer mission that was with us throughout the period like the AU, EU and the Commonwealth missions”.

He invited African leaders to the inauguration of the president-elect, Nana Akufo-Addo, on January 7, 2017.