Mahama restarts Dagbon peace process

President John DramaniMahama has kick start a process to resume peace talk between the Abudu and Andani Royal families towards an amicable settling of the protracted Yendi skin dispute that culminated in the death of the late Ya Na Yakubu Andani.

This welcomed development was reached following a closed door meeting with the two Gates in the Dagbon conflict, eminent persons, the National Peace Council and the President of the National House of Chiefs.

The peace talk will be led by the Asantehene Otumfuo Osei Tutu II with support from the Overlord of the Gonja Traditional Area, Yagbonwura Tuntumba Bore Essa I and the Overlord of the Mamprugu Traditional Area, Nayiri Naabohagu Mahami Abdula Shariga.

The three eminent Chiefs are expected to announce the timetable for their follow-up meetings and inform the two sides shortly. Clashes between the two gates in Yendibetween, March 25-27, 2002, resulted in the death of the Dagbon Overlord, Ya Na YakubuAndani and dozens of others. Then President John AgyakumKufuor instituted a Commission of Inquiry, chaired by Justice I.N.K. Wuaku, to investigate the Yendi disturbances, identify the perpetrators and make appropriate recommendations. The Commission recommended among others, that the Government should make conscious efforts to reconcile the two royal gates of Dagbon. Some Forty-one (41) persons including a former District Chief Executive for Yendi, Mr Mohammed HabibTijani, suspected to be linked to the atrocity, were arrested in 2010 in a swoop by the security. Fifteen of them were then put before a Fast Track High Court in Accra, following rigorous screening. They were however, acquitted and discharged after the court held that prosecution failed to prove that the charred remains of an adult male body were that of the Ya-Na to warrant the prosecution of the accused persons in the first place. For 600 years the Abudu and Andani clans, named after two sons of the ancient Dagbon king YaNaaYakubu I, cordially rotated control of the kingdom centered in Yendi. As of January 2014, a regent has acted as senior of the kingdom (installed 2006) until a new ruler is chosen to occupy the revered Lion Skins of Yendi.