8 Guns, 70 ammunition retrieved in Bimoba-Mamprusi clashes

The Northern Regional Police Command has impounded eight firearms and over seventy ammunitions after the latest renewed clashes between Bimobas and Mamprusis in the region.

The violent brawl allegedly started when Bimobas attacked some Mamprusi settlements on suspicion that the Mamprusis had killed their relative. The Mamprusis, thus responded by also attacking Bimoba communities.

In the end, four lives were lost and over forty houses torched. Fourteen people have been picked up after the conflict, and seven already remanded into prison custody to reappear in court on the 22nd of April 2014.

They have been charged with murder, conspiracy to commit crime, causing damage and possessing firearms without legal authority. Confirming the developments to Ultimate Radio, Public Relations Officer of the Northern Regional Police, ASP Ebenezer Tetteh said, “the weapons that we retrieved, we have three AK 47s, we have three locally made short guns, one pistol and one G3 rifle”.

The Northern Region has over the years gained notoriety for violent clashes along tribal lines, and in some cases, with political undertones leading to loss of lives and property. But ASP Ebenezer Tetteh told Ultimate Radio that until tribes in the region see the need to foster unity and trust among themselves, the violent clashes will keep reoccurring.

“If the people continue to mistrust each other and continue to pick arms and cutlasses and axes at the least provocation, these things will continue to happen. The people themselves must be willing and prepared to dialogue and sit down and iron out their differences and the kind of mistrust that exists between them. They must try as much as possible to build confidence and trust between each other,” ASP Ebenezer Tetteh reiterated.

He, however, gave assurances that some more security personnel have been called in from other regions to beef up security in the specific hotspots to ensure that calm is fully restored.