Nakpanduri, a place where beauty and business kiss each other in peace. Brisk businesses here have not dented the town's natural beauty.

Far from the Ghana's capital, Accra, you won't see drivers crossing into lanes haphazardly. The lanes that cross into each other are tribes crossing into another to marry. There are lots of inter-marriages between the two main ethnic groups; the Konkombas’ and the Bimobas’.

This solid friendship continued until a day, when controversy over the ownership of a parcel of land in one of Nakpanduri’s suburb, Kpamali dismantled the peace like a stone ripples quiet waters.

“They cut my brother into pieces. I cannot even describe how they did it but it was a painful thing to me".

“They started cutting the feet, they shot the leg here and the leg was broken and they used a cutlass to cut the head and another part and they cut here too; in fact all the body”, a gruesome account two years ago at the height of a tribal war in Nakpanduri.

After many dastardly moments of madness, blood failed to buy peace for the people of Nakpanduri. They know it now because the peace they now enjoy was through a new and bloodless approach.

Seth Kwame Boateng was there in the heat of the conflict in the Northern Regional town two years ago and produced a documentary titled; “BLOODY LAND”.  

The stench of war is over, a breeze of peace is dominant and Seth Kwame Boateng walks us through what it took to end the killings in Nakpanduri.

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People fight over land because it is one of the few resources that have a limited supply. The law of supply and demand as it applies to land can lead to civil unrest, political instability, war and famine. Also the more land a person, a chief or a country controls, the more powerful they appear to be.

During my tour for this documentary I interacted with locals who shared painful memories of the conflict. 57 year old security man, Laar Dubik had his 29 year-old brother “literally butchered”, a few weeks after the young man graduated from the Wa campus of the University of Development Studies.

Laar Dubik

“It is painful. If my brother were even sick and died and I buried him, I would have been happy. But somebody I was walking with and within some 30 minutes you hear the person has died and he was killed with guns and cutlasses were used to slain him; you know, it is very painful and sad news”

A 33-year old woman Bindeo Lamisi had a close shave with death in the heat of the hostilities. She was bathing when people she believed were their rivals shot her. The bullet pierced through her body.

 “I was dressing up after taking my bath. The moment I stretched for my clothes, I heard a gun shot. In no time it hit my right hand. I did not see the one who shot me”

Lamisi was lucky she did not die. But there were scores of people from both the Bimoba and Nakpanduri side who died especially in the first major violence in 2012.

Schools were shut down for the safety of students and their teachers. Pupil numerical strength close to 600-700 in a school reduced drastically to 74/76. Teens were targeted because each group saw in them a potential leader of the tribe who could come back for revenge killings.

That violence saw the burning of scores of homes and other properties. Some 167 houses belonging to the Bimoba’s were set ablaze. They retaliated by storming the Kpamali area which is a predominantly Konkomba community burnt and flattened some 31 houses there.

Insecurity reached its peak in Nakpanduri. Schools had to be closed down because education installations were not also spared. Nakpanduri Business Senior High School students were severely affected.  One of the students, Jamon Dapoh Clever recounts some of the ordeals they went through.

 

“I was seated under the light pole and we heard a gunshot. It was in the night so where will you run to? As a stranger, where will you run to? You may want to run into the bush but what if they meet you there?”

“It has really affected us especially our studies because the moment we hear gunshots, we start running helter skelter not knowing where we are going. Though it happens at the other side, sometimes, bullets come here”.

“So if you are even here, it means you are not safe. You can easily get killed though you are in school and not on the battle field”

It was a bloody land then but now, the wind of peace is blowing.

“Those we were fighting with, that was the konkombas, they have come back. We are greeting, responding, laughing, and marketing together; actually I am telling you I am happy because we are now friends and what was worrying me, it has past so as a man, if something is done and past, you have to forget” a man said.

With sworn enemies turned neighbours, the people of Nakpanduri have sworn to never again let any blood flow in their once-deadly town.

“Anybody who dares initiate any fight, we will fight him, the government will fight him and of course the gods of our land will fight him. That is my promise that never again will this happen”

The only solution then to halt the wanton killings and destruction of properties was an imposition of a 6pm to 6am curfew in the area.

A combined team of military and police personnel was detailed to Nakpanduri to end the atrocities. They were heavily armed and were positioned at strategic areas. Their patrol vehicles got no rest. They were instructed to ensure nothing went wrong. And that included doing whatever possible to ensure and promote law and order.

But the curfew seriously slowed down all forms of transactions.

After weeks of investigating the killings and destructions in this beautiful town of Nakpanduri all because of a disagreement over a parcel of land, I came up with a documentary titled,  BLOODY LAND.

Nakpanduri Chief David Kansok says the “BLOODY LAND” documentary compelled them to end the killings and the destructions.

Nakpanduri Chief David Kansok

“That was something that gingered me up; the documentary, Bloody Land, I said I have to refute this thing and I have to get this title off Nakpanduri because there are other explosive areas and for Nakpanduri to be chosen as a bloody land, it did not go down well with me so I said ok, I won’t talk but will act.

“When there is absolute peace then those who gave us the title, the bloody land, they will be quick to change it to another title which will be better”

The Nakpanduri Chief was not the only one who felt ashamed of the content of the BLOODY LAND documentary. Some opinion leaders expressed similar concerns. Simon Nyimon is the immediate past assemblyman at Nakpanduri.

“We look at Bawku, Yendi where they had such clashes but they were not given this caption but we had it. In fact looking at it the youth saw that if the caption continues to be on the community, it means that there wouldn’t be any development in the community because when you travel and you mention that you are coming from Nakpanduri, you will hear them say the bloody land”.

So the search for peace started. Opinion leaders from both sides, conflict resolution experts, traditional leaders, the clergy and top government officials all gathered to think of the way forward. The head of a peaceful district, the East Mamprusi District Chief Executive Adam Imoro played a crucial role in bringing all the factions together.

“We can only facilitate but the peace is in their hands. If they want it they can get it. If they don’t want it they can never get it and when they realized and appreciated what I told them, they started working at it. They realized that the only way out is for them to make compromises and that is how we got it done)

In situations like this, a third party is needed to serve as a mediator when parties in a conflict situation decide to meet to settle their differences. Such a person will not judge but will be present to direct the conversation. Outgoing Northern Regional Minister Alhaji Muniru Limuna says he got some people to play that role.

“Then finally we got the overload of that area that is the Nayiri to come in and I believe when they sincerely agreed that they were going to resolve the matters, the Nayiri finally got them a cola and that thing means a lot in their culture. So long as you have said that you will never hurt Kwame Boateng again and I want to swear that I have forgiven him, traditionally if you say that and you chew the cola it has its consequences. That was the sincerest way of resolving the matter culturally)

So at the forecourt of the palace of the overlord of in Nalerigu, a ceremony to officially handover the cola to the Nakpanduri and Kpamli chief was held.

Kpamli chief

With reverence, the two walked for their cola and followed up with a traditional dance. Then followed a pledge to ensure peace is restored in Nakpanduri.

The Chief of Nakpanduri address at Nayiri said;

“The work of the evil one made us to fight and to loose lives and properties. Now we have each learnt our lessons, we have learnt the effects of war and we are calling on other people here who are true sons of mamprugu to also learn lessons from what we have gone through “

This drum is beaten every morning to remind subjects of the King of Mamprugu of how powerful and influential the Nayiri, Mahami Bohagu Abdulai Shariga is. A promise or a vow made in his presence cannot be broken because of the dire consequences that may accompany it.

So when the former enemies returned to Nakpanduri, they made real the promise they made. The Nakpanduri Chief David Kansok, initiated the process by taking a major risk.

“The Konkomba’s came and I had to accommodate them in my own house here. We slept in the same room. I and the Konkomba chiefs and I did this to ensure that everybody will see practically that I was prepared for peace. So I slept with them, we ate together, we did everything together then the following day I sent them to church”

The District Chief Executive of East Mamprusi, Adam Imoro said this was a big risk but was very important.

“...that day it was a risk we took because anything could have happened. The Konkomba’s where not happy that their chief was moving to that extent to stay with the Nakpanduri chief who was a Bimoba man. The Bimobas were also not happy that they were going to accommodate the Konkomba chief so everybody was in a way preparing but God being so great, the Nakpanduri chief was able to handle things such that they were able to stay together at least for a week)

Risk infers the possibility that things might not work out the way we expect and the unknown is always scary. We ask ourselves “what if the worst happens?”. But risk makes us feel alive. Life without risks is life stuck in a rut. 

The chiefs took that risk and it opened all other closed doors.