# Second Lomé Convention Signed (31 October 1979)

URL: https://allhistories.com/togo/timeline/1979-second-lome-convention-signed
Location: Lomé, Togo
Themes: main-event

The Second ACP-EEC Convention of Lomé was signed in Lomé on 31 October 1979, according to the Dutch treaty database. Wikipedia's article on the Convention dates its application from January 1981 to February 1985. The agreement continued the trade preferences and compensation schemes of the first Convention of 1975. Lomé II set aid and investment at about 5.5 billion European units of account, against about 3 billion in the first Convention. The STABEX scheme, which compensated ACP states when world prices of key agricultural exports fell, and the Sysmin scheme for minerals were retained. The ACP group had grown since 1975. A third Convention was signed in Lomé on 8 December 1984, with about 8.5 billion units of account, and took effect in March 1985 for trade and May 1986 for aid. The cycle of conventions made the capital a recurrent venue for North–South diplomacy. The available sources do not give the number of ACP states at the Lomé II signing or any Togo-specific provisions. At this point in the timeline (1979), Gnassingbé Eyadéma took power in the 1967 coup and was President until his death on 5 February 2005; his long rule, its human-rights record and the legitimacy of its elections are assessed differently by different sources. Reign dates for this ruler are disputed between sources.

## Why it matters
Lomé II consolidated the framework of preferential trade and compensation that structured relations between Europe and its former colonies.

Ruler at the Time: [Gnassingbé Eyadéma](https://allhistories.com/togo/rulers/gnassingbe-eyadema-1967)

## Sources
- [Wikipedia — Lomé Convention](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lom%C3%A9_Convention)
- [treatydatabase.overheid.nl — 000809](https://treatydatabase.overheid.nl/en/Treaty/Details/000809)
- [treatydatabase.overheid.nl — 000175](https://treatydatabase.overheid.nl/en/Treaty/Details/000175)