Dagbon Crisis: Andanis withdraw from Otumfuo’s peace roadmap

The Andani Royal family has withdrawn from the Asantehene, Otumfou Osei Tutu II, led mediation committee.

The family said at a press conference in Tamale Saturday accused the committee tasked to develop a roadmap to peace in Dagbon after the brutal assassination of its overlord, the late Yaa-Naa Yakubu Andani II and many others and destruction of the Gbewaa Palace at Yendi of bias.

The family has, therefore, vowed not to respect the roadmap declaration by the committee to restore peace in Dagbon.

The Asantehene, Otumfou Osei Tutu II led committee of eminent chiefs mediating the crisis on Friday 16 November made a symbolic and definitive declaration to bring finality to the nearly 40-year-old conflict between the Abudu and Andani royal families.

The conflict for years slowed and impoverished every facet of progress in the entire Northern region and rattled the nation’s treasury.

However, despite a passionate appeal to both the feuding gate by President Akufo-Addo to embrace the progress report of the Committee for the restoration of peace in the Dagbon, the Andanis say they are pulling out.

The withdrawal from the peace process comes a day after the installation of a new regent for Dagbon, Yaa Naa Mahamadu Abdulai IV, under the enskinment name Bolin Lana.

He will be the acting overlord of Dagbon until December 28 when the funeral late overlord of Dagbon, Yaa Naa Mahamud Abdulai IV ends.

Announcing the decision at the press conference, the spokesperson for the Andani Royal gate Kpan-Naa Abubakari Andani also accused the government of aiding the Abudu Family to create a parallel authority in Dagbon by allowing the newly enskinned Regent of Abudu Family to refer to himself as Regent of Dagbon.

He said: “We wonder how the Otumfuo and his committee hopes to make progress with the program they rolled out at the Flag Staff House when major players around whom the program will revolve have been cynically ignored in favor of a self-seeking rogue which has no legitimacy.

“What, therefore, the Asantehene and the eminent chiefs have done is to shoot first and aim later. Regrettably, they have missed the point and the entire program is destined to crumble like a vast hit by a sledgehammer.”

The committee, led by the Asantehene, Otumfou Osei Tutu II, tasked to develop a roadmap to peace in Dagbon after the brutal assassination of its overlord, the late Yaa-Naa Yakubu Andani II and many others and destruction of the Gbewaa Palace at Yendi following days of extensive deadly clashes in 2002, on 16 November finally announced dates for the performance of the contentious funerals of the former two overlords, whose deaths have caused and continued to renew divisions among the two royal families.