Building paths to peace: Bo Peace and Reconciliation Movement
"I just have a sympathetic heart for my people, that's all," says Peace Monitor Kemoh Gebendeh Bassie.
© Rosalind Hanson-Alp / Conciliation Resources
Case study: Kemoh Gendeh Bassie, BPRM peace monitor
Kemoh Gendeh Bassie is BPRM’s youngest peace monitor. At 26 years old, he has been solving mainly domestic conflicts and building peace between families and neighbours since 2004.
Kemoh is a member of the Jaima-Bongo Descendants Association (JAGBONDA), a local organization which forms part of BPRM and was set up to help bring people together for peace in the Jaima-Bongo chiefdom in Bo District. He first witnessed BPRM’s work at one of their organized Peace and Reconciliation Carnivals, where chiefdom communities come together to celebrate the unity BPRM have helped create, make new friends and play sports together.
Now Kemoh works as a BPRM Peace Monitor mainly based in Bo town although he sometimes accompanies other BPRM staff to the rural communities to help in the process of reconciliation, which he considers exciting as he learns more skills in the art of conflict transformation.
Kemoh admits that he has learned a great deal since he first started. “I now have the confidence to settle disputes between people, like domestic arguments and street fighting. I don’t like animosity between people.” Most of the conflicts he deals with are domestic. Despite his youthful appearance, which people react to with scepticism at first, his calm and caring manner bring out a mature wisdom.
Recently, Kemoh was called at night by a neighbour who knows him for his mediation skills. He was asked to intervene in a domestic fight where a husband was beating his wife after discovering she had been unfaithful. Kemoh arrived at the house to find the husband in a rage and tried to calm him down but he wouldn’t listen. After some hours, the man’s aggression subsided and he agreed to talk. The man admitted that if Kemoh had not been there he may not have been able to control his anger. Together with a fellow peace monitor, Kemoh visited the couple the next day where they talked with the couple’s family to find a solution to their domestic problems. Eventually, the couple agreed to work at their marriage and both were sorry for their behaviour.
When thinking about his dreams, Kemoh is clear: “in
future I would like the opportunity to do peacebuilding in other countries,
wherever there are problems.”
