Security Analyst, Adib Saani, has expressed concern about the unending nature of the Bawku conflict which remains unresolved.
Reacting to the killing of three persons in the Bawku Municipality recently, he averred that the issue is a “sorry state”. The Security Analyst stated that currently, the Bawku conflict is part of about 352 unresolved chieftaincy conflicts around the country.
“I have my people on the ground who called me and I listened to the gunshots live. I also received pictures of the people who have been allegedly killed. This conflict has been pending for way too long.”
Adib Saani
According to Adib Saani, the unfortunate thing is that the nation has focused its attention on peace keeping rather than dealing with the fundamental issues. This, he intimated, makes the issue recur and has become more or less a cycle.
Commenting on how to deal with the menace, he stated that no amount of rhetoric’s can stop the violence. He called for action to be taken on the violence and revealed that one of the biggest issues the nation has to contend with is the proliferation of small arms and light weapons in the Bawku area.
Adib Saani posited that the trend has to be reversed and called for an improvement in intelligence gathering. “Sometimes, there are some notable persons on the grounds and everybody knows that they are the trouble causers. So, we need to improve intelligence so that we will be able to get them.”
“We saw another video with two AK-47 riffles retrieved from inside a sack filled with grains in two thousand sacks. You can imagine how cumbersome it will be to see lots of these things if intelligence didn’t exist. Intelligence should be able to tell and perhaps prevent it from getting into the wrong hands.”
Adib Saani
Adib Saani noted that unfortunately, when the military takes actions, “all sort of human rights advocates” will attack the military stating that they acted in a manner that wasn’t right. “They will even start identifying who are the Sissala’s and the Mamprusi’s and even start to single them out for criticism.”
“I think it’s unfortunate. We cannot glorify the happenings, if not, it will keep recurring and present to us a much more heated situation with respect to terrorism.”
Adib Saani
Issue complicated than it looks
Touching on how to single out the ethnic groups involved and deal with the menace, Adib Saani averred that the issue is more complicated than it looks. He stated that a lot of governments including the present administration always wish to manage the conflicts until they leave office rather than solve it.
The Security Analyst suggested that the issue needs the type of assertiveness used by the current administration in dealing with the Dagbon issue, equally applied. “Unfortunately, we don’t seem to see that.”
Adib Saani’s comments came after three people were shot dead in an attack in Bawku. This is reported to be as a result of the conflict between Kusasi’s and Mamprusi’s in the Bawku municipality. According to reports, during a heavy downpour in the Bawku Municipality, one faction moved to the side of another faction and launched an attack which resulted in the killing of three people comprising two men and a breastfeeding mother.
The local authorities, according to the residents, are yet to comment on the attacks. However, security has been tightened in the Bawku Municipality with more Policemen being deployed to the Municipality in large numbers.
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