MIXED REACTION GREET AVOKA'S REASSIGNMENT (PAGE 16, JAN 28, 2010)

THERE have been mixed reactions in Bawku in the Upper East Region to the ministerial reshuffle announced by the President, particularly with regard to the reassignment of Mr Cletus Avoka.
The President, John Evans A. Mills, replaced Mr Cletus Avoka with Martin Amidu as Minister for the Interior in the ministerial reshuffle last Monday.
When the Daily Graphic sampled views of some residents in Bawku, they said his reassignment boded well for the peace process in Bawku, while others said his removal as the Interior Minister did not make any difference as far as the search for peace in Bawku was concerned.
Ever since he was appointed the Interior Minister, a section of the populace in Bawku, especially the Mamprusis, have doubted the neutrality of the MP for Zebilla, who at one time served as counsel for the Kusasis.
Some Mamprusis went to the extent of appealing to the President to reassign the Zebilla MP, but the seasoned lawmaker vehemently disagreed with those assertions, insisting that he was capable of handling the office.
A leading member of the Mamprusi tribe in Bawku, Mohammed Tahiru Nambe, in an interview, said the replacement of Mr Avoka with Mr Amidu did not change anything as the latter was once a counsel for the Kusasis in 2003 when he represented the Kusasi at the Supreme Court in 2003.
According to him, much as he respects the competence of Martin Amidu, his unflinching allegiance to the Kusasis in the past could obstruct him from being fair and neutral in the handling of the situation on the ground.
“That notwithstanding, we will have to adopt a wait-and-see attitude to see how he is going to handle the peace process in Bawku. I want to believe he will be impartial and we are prepared to give him a helping hand,” Mr Nambe said.
For his part, another elder of the Mamprusi side, Alhaji Kobila, cautioned Mr Martin Amidu to be neutral and not be seen as interfering with the peace process in favour of the other side.
“Everybody in Bawku is interested in peace, and so we expect him to work for all and not for some few people.”
Mr Thomas Abilla, a Kusasi and Personal Assistant to the Bawku Naba, asserted that Mr Avoka had never been an impediment to the peace process in Bawku.
He said the records were there for all to see, and insisted on “facts and facts”, saying “we don’t expect anyone to change the facts”.
Bawku has been a conflict area since Independence. There had been numerous clashes between the Mamprusis and the Kusasis, with the most recent one in December 2007.
Both the Police and the Military have been deployed to Bawku metropolis to restore the peace in the area.