The competition watchdog for Africa’s largest trading bloc, Common Market for East and Southern Africa (Comesa), is enhancing its mandate to better protect consumers, unveiling new regulations aimed at safeguarding buyers in a rapidly evolving digital economy.

 

The Comesa Competition Commission will now operate as the Comesa Competition and Consumer Commission, reflecting what officials describe as “changing times” in regional and global markets.

The change coincides with the launch of new regulations that seek to protect consumers of goods and services. On Wednesday, February 24, 2026, in Livingstone, Zambia, the Commission officially presented the new common market regulations to participants from North, West, East and Southern Africa, as well as Europe and the United States.

For the Commission, this process that began in 2021 will address gaps in the 2004 regulation. Dr Willard Mwemba, CEO of the Commission, noted that globalisation and rapid technological advances have reshaped market dynamics and altered how producers and consumers interact.“As markets are dynamic, laws must not remain static. They must be amended to reflect change,” he stressed, adding that the revisions will enable competition authorities to intervene in conduct that could irreversibly disrupt markets.

He attributed the growth to increased internet penetration and the rapid spread of digital technologies. The World Bank estimates that more than 160 million Africans gained broadband access between 2019 and 2022. Sub-Saharan Africa saw a 115 percent rise in internet users between 2016 and 2021, while 191 million individuals made or received digital payments between 2014 and 2021.

The Comesa region, with 682 million consumers across 21 countries, is no exception. “The 2004 law was inadequate on these issues,” Dr Mwemba said. The new law, presented on 24 February, is designed to address them. According to Comesa officials, the text “is not a set of theories, but a practical document that broadens the Commission’s mandate.”The digital provisions cover mergers between technology companies and explicitly provide for monitoring and protecting consumer rights, tackling abuses of dominant positions, misleading practices, and harmful online content.

For Chileshe Mpundu Kapwepwe, Secretary General of Comesa, the revision of the law is not merely legal but also economic. With the Comesa area’s GDP exceeding $1.1 trillion, she emphasised: “The Regulation broadens the perspective of public interest to include employment, SME participation, and environmental concerns, ensuring sustainability.”The Commission has pledged that in implementing the new law, the CCCC will prioritise transparency and constructive dialogue with stakeholders to ensure the Regulation strengthens, rather than stifles, the business environment—boosting wealth creation and regional integration.

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