The Gonja-Nawuri conflict in retrospect: achieving peaceful coexistence in a troubled land of Northern Ghana

Abstract

This study examined the roles of indigenous actors and the complementary efforts made by Government and Civil Society Organizations to resolve the deadlock between the Gonja and Nawuri ethnic groups in the Kpandai district of Ghana. Classical conflict theories such as primordial, constructionist and instrumentalist were employed to underpin the causes of the conflict. In-depth interviews and focus group discussions were employed to obtain data from the respondents, while purposive sampling technique was used to select 96 respondents who had in-depth knowledge of the conflict. The analysis revealed that the government of Ghana employed multiple strategies such as deployment of security personnel, setting up of committees – the Justice Ampiah Committee, and the Permanent Peace Negotiation Team to manage and resolve the conflict but to no avail. Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) such as the Nairobi Peace Initiative only succeeded in opening communication between the conflict parties in Kumasi but could not also resolve the conflict. The study also revealed that interveners sidelined indigenous conflict resolution mechanisms and local authorities such as the chiefs, religious leaders, the gerontocratic approach and Tengdana- all embedded in the local culture of resolving conflict. The study further discovered that endogenisation of conflict resolution, where both indigenous knowledge and interveners‟ roles are combined is best fit to resolve inter-ethnic conflicts. It is recommended, among others, that the government, CSOs, and local actors should complement the roles of each other to find a lasting solution to the conflict.