The Centre for Conflict Transformation and Peace Studies, has admonished traditional authorities in Gonja Traditional area to resort to the use of Alternative Dispute Resolution, ADR, to address the numerous pockets of conflicts that have engulfed the area for decades.
According to the Centre, traditional leaders must exhibit good leadership skills to create a peaceful co-existence for its people and manage conflicts through the right mechanism to accelerate development.
The Executive Director of the Centre, Revered Father Clement Aapengnuo made this remark at a workshop organized by the Gonjaland Youth Association at Damango in the Savannah region aimed at building the capacities of the chiefs.
The workshop was attended by over hundred paramount chiefs, queen mothers and opinion leaders.
BACKGROUND
Protracted conflicts have undermined the development of Northern Ghana for decades. Although largely localized, these conflicts have created an image of Northern Ghana as lawless and violent, discouraging investments as well as devastating lives and livelihoods.
The Savannah region is very positioned to contribute to and benefit from the Ghana Beyond Aid agenda.
However, accelerating the sustainable development can only take place in a peaceful atmosphere.
The recent chieftaincy disputes in Gonjaland are a reminder that peace building is a process and not an event. Gonjaland was once the oasis of a peaceful chieftaincy institution with a solid traditional system for managing succession disputes.
However, the situation is not same ‘today’, since conflicts including chieftaincy, land and ethnic have taken over the land depriving people of their livelihoods and dignity.
The President of the Association, Lawyer Osman Mohammed Amin, said the association is working in collaboration with stakeholders to review the constitutions of the Gonjaland Youth Association and the 1930 constitution of the Gonja kingdom.
According to him, the move is to preserve and sustain the culture and tradition in the area.
The Executive Director of the Centre, Revered Father Clement Aapengnuo, said it is the duty of traditional leaders to determine the politics, economic and technology of traditional settings.
However, poverty and the thirst for power had change the chieftaincy institutions and rendered it a non-performing one.
The Vice President of Gonja Traditional Council, Buipewura Jinapor, commended the Gonjaland Youth Association for organizing the workshop since it is the first of its kind in the history of Gonjaland.
He called for unity among the chiefs and charged them to be inclusive, participatory and consultative leaders.
Some of the chiefs and opinion leaders raised concerns ranging from succession, land disputes, duties of a chief, illegal rosewood activities in the area and enskinment issues.
Story filed by Joyce Kantam Kolamong
