Building paths to peace: Bo Peace and Reconciliation Movement
Voluntary peace monitor and chief, Ernest Missalie, was one of the leaders in the succession of upper Niawa-Lenga.
Andie Yamba is Niawa-Lenga’s oldest community member and remembers the day when the Colonial officials came to mark chiefdom boundaries when, as a young girl, Yamba met the District Officer by the river. Her own family was split because of the conflict.
The Yamba family in Niawa-Lenga whose ancestors were involved in the chiefdom boundary dispute and were part of the negotiations to end the conflict.
© Rosalind Hanson-Alp / Conciliation Resources
Case study: Niawa-Lenga and Selenga chiefdoms
Ever since the Colonial Government sent officials to survey chiefdom boundaries in1964, Niawa-Lenga and Selenga have been in conflict.
In 1964 British Colonial officials arrived on the border of Niawa-Lenga and Selenga chiefdoms with maps in hand. They were marking chiefdom boundaries. At that time both chiefdoms were integrated, through marriages, friendships and cooperatives. The borders were not clearly defined as people shared the farmland on the periphery of their chiefdoms. There was no protest when villages were merged and new boundaries set as the Paramount Chiefs were close friends. However, as the years went by and the chiefs passed away, the union between the chiefdoms weakened and people resented the merger and made claims to the bordering farmland.
Conflicts between farmers and their families spread, and the border became a danger zone, with both sides destroying each other’s crops, property and traps that lay at the edge of the disputed land. Thirty years later, after severing many family bonds, tensions were still high and, with the presence of a significant number of ex-combatants, people feared it would become more violent.
District Councillor Joseph Bindi heard about BPRM when they made a presentation of their work to the local council and requested their intervention in helping find a solution to the conflict. BPRM sent an assessment team to identify the root causes and key players in the conflict. After several months of talking with both communities and training those involved in the conflict as voluntary peace monitors, BPRM called for a ‘libation ceremony’, a traditionally valuable seal to the reconciliation process. A draft peace agreement was drawn up by conflicting parties, but it took BPRM another eleven months of consultations before the final agreement was accepted by both chiefdoms, and subsequently filed with the National Council of Chiefs.
Nearly a year after BPRM started mediating and after more than 30 years of conflict, over 300 people witnessed the signing ceremony of the peace agreement between Niawa-Lenga and Selenga chiefdoms. In a closing statement Councillor Joseph Bindi said that he “believed that the signing would provide the basis for genuine love and unity in the hearts and minds of every citizen, which would promote sustainable peace and development for both chiefdoms.” Three years after the ceremony both chiefdoms continue to enjoy their peace and families have been reunited.
