Bimbilla (N/R), Jan 11, GNA - The feeling of insecurity among the people in Bimbilla and its surrounding communities is worrying as there are signs that people in the district are already in a conflict situation.

"There are indications that the Nanumbas and Konkombas are already in conflict, the only difference is that it has not yet escalated into an open one", Mr. Salifu Saeed, Nanumba North District Chief Executive, told newsmen in Bimbilla on Wednesday.

Mr Saeed, who was briefing newsmen on the recent insecurity situation in the district, said some Nanumbas staying in Konkomba communities are fleeing to Bimbilla with their belongings amid the suspicion that Konkombas were preparing to attack them.

Tension in the area escalated on Tuesday when police intercepted 2,500 cartridges and a shotgun being smuggled into Bimbilla by two Konkomba men.

Mr. Saeed said intelligence reports reaching the District Security Committee (DISEC) were frightening and that the DISEC was collaborating with the security personnel in the area to calm the situation. The DCE said Bimbilla has for the past years had experienced a protracted chieftaincy dispute that resulted in clashes last year and urged the two ethnic groups to give peace a chance.

Mr. Mustapha Abdul-Muhinin, a Coordinator at the Nanumba North District of the National Youth Employment Programme (NYEP), said teachers who are Nanumbas and are teaching in the Konkomba communities were afraid to go to school.

Similarly, traders are disturbed that the market system in the area would break down should war break out, a situation they said would impact negatively on their economies and hamper development. Mr. Thomas Donkor Ogajah, Nanumba South District Chief Executive, said the interception of the cartridges was a coincidence and should be treated as an individual case.

He said people in the district should not interpret the incident to mean that Konkombas were preparing to attack the Nanumbas. Mr. Ogajah said the common enemy of the two ethnic groups was poverty and underdevelopment and that Konkombas were not interested in going to war.

Konkombas and Nanumbas fought in 1981 and in 1994.