The Bawku conflict …truth must be told (1)
Bawku has been in the news since November 2021 and the events have continued to take violent and unpredictable twist and turns in the past few weeks. Many Ghanaians, sadly including some individual state, government and opposition functionaries have literally ignored the violence as taking place somewhere far away in the north or shied away from publicly commenting on the issue because it is “too sensitive” or “too complicated”. Some media houses and personnel have largely been cowered and intimidated by parties in the conflict from doing objective journalistic work to educate Ghanaians on the issue. So-called security experts who know little to nothing about the geography, demography and history of Bawku line up on national TV stations to propagate misinformation and offer lame academic opinions.
CHIEFTAINCY THE MAIN ISSUE
First of all, the conflict is supposed to be between Kusasis and Mamprusis (two different ethnic groups) over Bawku chieftaincy. It is not a fight between two rival royal gates. Bawku is NOT Dagbong. Mamprusis from the North East Region claim to be the rightful rulers of Bawku because their forefathers were enskinned as Bawku Nabas by the chief of Nalerigu or Nayiri during colonial times. Kusasis counter-claim that Bawku is their traditional territory and that Mamprusi chiefs were imposed on them during colonial rule in 1932.
When the conflict first erupted in the 50s, the colonial government set up a Committee of Inquiry to investigate. The three-member committee, made up of S. D. Opoku-Afari (Chairman), Nana Yaw Agyeman Badu I – Dormaa Hene (Member) and Lure Kanton III – Tumu Koro (Member). After visiting the area and extensively interviewing key figures from both sides, the committee recommended thus:
![IT must be one of the most difficult – and exasperating – tasks in the world to be the President of a nation like Ghana. For you may travel all over4 the world, talking to the leaders of “the developed nations”, to try persuade them that the pandemic that is afflicting the world, Covid-19 (with its variants) is a truly global destroyer and thatnowhere is safe from it, until everywhere is safe. You may deploy your most eloquent language to point out that although, the scientists of the “developed countries” have managed to manufacture a vaccine that has been seen to work against the pandemic, the politicians of the “developed countries” are, contrary to undertakings they have made to the World Health Organisation (WHO) hoarding the vaccine in their countries. Reports suggest that whereas the governments of the “developed countries” are targeting 100 percent of their populace for vaccination, and getting closer to their objective every day, less than 10% of the populace of the developing countries have so far been vaccinated, as a result of a lack of vaccines. Is this fair? you ask. Air travel (you continue) has made international contacts extremely easy. And since the Covid-19 virus and its latest variant (Omicron) in particOman Ghana versus Covid-19 08 www.ghanaiantimes.com.gh GHANAIAN Times Features TUESDAY, DECEMBER 21, 2021ular, are very transmissible. So it is in everyone's educated self-interest to see that all people on the planet are fully vaccinated. As a result of your Government's efforts, you hear that plenty of vaccines have arrived in your country and you are emboldened to announce that your Government will soon be able to vaccinate its entire adult population. Then, you get the shock of your life: an intelligence report tells you that some mischievous people are spreading the fake news that if a person allows himself or herself to be vaccinated, the “vaccine will make that person vote for your governing NPP whether he/she wants to do so or not!” WHAAAAT! How does one counter such fake news? If the Government say it is not true, the conspiracy theorists shoot back, “And are you so naïve as to expect them to admit that the vaccine will make you vote for the NPP?” Wow! Are people so wicked that despite the gains that the world has already made through vaccination (such as the elimination of small pox from the world and the near-extinction of polio and yellow fever) they try to dissuade others from taking advantage of anti-Covid vaccination? Especially since people who are clever enough to invent such fake news must know of the horrible pain that Covid-19 subjects people to, before it finally kills them? What makes the anti-Covid vaccination story doubly awful is that its seeds are sown on pre-fertilised ground. In the past, some wicked scientists in the developed countries have allowed themselves to be used by their [usually racist] governments to administer harmful vaccines and other medications to people, using the lie that such interventions can save them from certain disease. One of the most devastating such deceptions occurred in the United States in 1932. Below is the horrible story as told on the OFFICIAL website of the US CENTRES FOR DISEASE CONTROL [CDC]: https://www.cdc.gov/tuskegee/timeline.htm QUOTE: THE U.S. PUBLIC HEALTH SERVICE SYPHILIS STUDY AT TUSKEGEE In 1932, the USPHS, [US Public Health Service] working with the Tuskegee Institute, began a study to record the natural history of syphillis. It was originally called the “Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphillis in the Negro Male” (sic) [now referred to as the “USPHS Syphilis Study at Tuskegee”]. The study initially involved 600 Black men — 399 with syphillis, 201 who did not have the disease. Participants’ informed consent was not collected. Researchers told the men they were being treated for “bad blood,” a local term used to describe several ailments, including syphillis, anaemia, and fatigue. In exchange for taking part in the study, the men received free medical exams, free meals, and burial insurance (sic)! By 1943, penicillin was the treatment of choice for syphilis and becoming widely available, but the participants in the study were not offered treatment. In 1972, an Associated Press story about the study was published. As a result, the Assistant Secretary for Health and Scientific Affairs appointed an Ad Hoc Advisory Panel to review the study. The advisory panel concluded that the study was “ethically unjustified”; that is, the “results [were] disproportionately meagre, compared with known risks to [the] human subjects involved.” In March 1973, the panel advised the Secretary of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare to instruct the USPHS to provide all necessary medical care for the survivors of the study. The Tuskegee Health Benefit Programme was established to provide these services and in 1975, participants’ wives, widows and children were added to the program. In 1995, the program was expanded to include health, as well as medical, benefits. The last study participant died in January 2004. The last widow receiving THBP benefits died in January 2009. ... I973, a class-action lawsuit was filed on behalf of the study participants and their families, resulting in a $10 million, out-of-court settlement in 1974. On May 16, 1997, President Bill Clinton issued a formal Presidential Apology [over the study.] UNQUOTE In Ghana, the fake news that the anti-Covid vaccine would make people “vote for the NPP” has already begun to cause disagreements in some households. A family known to me has had to dismiss its house-help because she obstinately refused to take the jab. To illustrate the way the way the political message contained in the fake news has been camouflaged, I offer a version of the last conversation between the head of the household and the house-help: BOSS: Hey, “A”, you are very lucky! Instead of you going around to look for the vaccinators, they are coming to our estate! HOUSE-HELP: They are coming here? B: Yes! H: But Boss, I told you that my brother took the jab and had to be admitted into hospital. B: It doesn't mean that you too will become ill if you get the jab. It affects different people in different ways. Look, as you know, I have had all my own jabs and I have never been ill – as you know! H: But Boss, if you have taken all your jabs, then you are PROTECTED, are you not? B: Yes, I am. H: In that case, even if I become infected because I have not taken the jab, I cannot transmit the disease to you and YOU will be all right? B: I can't say that! Because, as I have explained to you, the pandemic can affect different people in different ways. H: Then the jab is useless? B: Listen, I can't take any risks with such a dangerous disease. Either you take it or you leave, I am sorry. I cannot allow you to expose me and my family to the risk of catching Covid. As I reported earlier, the House-help chose to leave. Both her Boss and I are convinced that it wasn't mere logicthat made her decide not to take the jab. She was probably under the influence of a church/cult. Or political propaganda! • Omicron cases at Kotoka International Airport are amongst the unvaccinated](https://ghanaiantimes.com.gh/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/GT-8.pdf-Adobe-Acrobat-Pro-DC-4-220x150.jpg)
“The Committee is satisfied that the old method of appointing a chief to go to Bawku and rule the Kusasi is greatly resented by the Kusasis. We felt that it is undemocratic as it is dictatorial for the Nayiri who claims to be the nominal owner of the land to send one of his Mamprusi subject to rule the Kusasis as their chief. We feel that the Kusasis would evolve politically and socially as well as economically better under their own chief than under an imported chief whom they resent.”
The government of the day issued a whitepaper declaring Kusasis owners of Bawku and the first Kusasi Bawku Naba, Abugrago Asigri Azoka I, elected by the Kusasis, as the rightful chief. The Mamprusis contested the findings in the Appeals Court, which ruled in 1958 that Bawku belonged to Kusasis and that Abugrago Asigri Azoka I was the rightful Bawku Naba.
MILITARY MEDDLING
Azoka I ruled from 1956 to 1966 when the Military Junta passed a Chieftaincy Amendment Decree, NLCD 112, destooling and deskinning all chiefs deemed sympathetic to the CPP government. Bawku chieftaincy was thus handed back to the Mamprusis. The Kusasis pursued the case under the Acheampong regime in 1972 and in response the Secretary to the Supreme Military Council, G. B. Boahene declared:
“My investigations into your allegations have revealed that the area in question is called Bawku District Council and not Mamprusi District Council. This alone is evidence that the area belongs to the Kusasis. Be that as it may, you might have realised that for some time now, there has been so complete a fusion of the tribes in the area that it is difficult to distinguish between Mamprusis and Kusasis. It is observed that, very few of the 18 Canton Chiefs in the district are Mamprusis. And once nearly all the 18 Canton Chiefs are Kusasis and have been properly enskinned, it is the desire of this Office to let sleeping dogs lie.”
It is significant to note that the status of Bawku as Kusasi traditional land is again affirmed. The only reason or excuse for the military authorities not to act at the time was “the complete fusion of the tribes” and the fact that “nearly all the 18 Canton chiefs are Kusasis”. Both conclusions are factually correct, except that even though the Mamprusi settlers in Bawku have inter-married with Kusasis, Moshies, Bisas, Hausas etc over the generations and few today barely speak Mampuli, they insist on their Mamprusi ancestry and continue to claim to be Mamprusis.
The attitude of successive military governments was the same: “let sleeping dogs lie”. But the Kusasis would not let sleeping dogs lie and eventually got a positive hearing during the Jerry John Rawlings PNDC regime in 1983 with the passage of PNDCL 75 reversing NLCD 112 and reinstating the status quo of 1957/58. The same decree posthumously deskinned the Mamprusi Bawku Naba, Adam Azangbeo who died in 1981, posthumously restored the late Kusasi Bawku Naba, Abugrago Azoka I who passed away in 1983 to the status of Bawku Naba, and installed his son, Abugrago Asigri Azoka II as Bawku Naba in April 1984.
A SUPREME COURT RULING ON BAWKU
In April 2003, the Mamprusis, led by Alhaji Ibrahim Adam Zangbeo filed a case in the Supreme Court against Abugrago Asigri Azoka II, challenging the legitimacy of the latter as Bawku Naba. In the course of the case the Mamprusis realized their claim had no legal merit and applied to the court to discontinue the case resulting in the following ruling on April 29th, 2003:
The application to discontinue is granted but without liberty to apply under PNDCL 75 and articles 270 and 277 of the 1992 constitution. Costs of 10,000,000.00 to the plaintiff.
This ruling was signed by Supreme Court Justices G. K. Acquah, T. K. Adzoe, S. A. Brobbey, S. G. Baddoo and DR. S. Twum. The ruling meant that Azoka II’s position as Bawku Naba remained unchallenged and unchallengeable and he has been the gazetted Bawku Naba for the past thirty-nine years. Despite the Supreme Court ruling, the Mamprusis refused to recognize Azoka II, and in late 2021 decided to perform the funeral of Adam Azangbeo who died way back in 1981, to pave the way for the enskinment of a Mamprusi Bawku Naba by the Nayiri. This was clearly a provocation of the Kusasis and a test to the government.
To be continued
BY REVEREND PROFESSOR JOHN AZUMAH
