The chiefs and people of the Wasipe Traditional Area in the North Gonja District want to know those behind some 59 AK-47 rifles that were smuggled to Walewale in the West Mamprusi District of the North East Region.

Addressing a press conference at Daboya in the North Gonja District of the Savanna Region, Chief Gbonapowura Mahama Saakan, who spoke on behalf of the Paramount Chief of the Wasipe Traditional Area, Wasipewura Mumuni Anyame Kabasagya, said the 59 rifles were seized at Ablekuma, a suburb of Accra en route to Walewale on Friday, 30 August 2019 and asked if there was some power behind the acquisition and shipment of the arms.

Gbonapowura Mahama Saakan, a former Member of Parliament (MP) for the then-Damongo/Daboya Constituency, said the silence of the Inspector-General of Police (IGP) and the National Security Secretariat, is not healthy for Ghana’s security and development, hence Ghanaians and the whole world deserves answers so that Ghana does not experience what happened in Rwanda.

“These weapons, without a doubt, are meant to annihilate Gonja folks in Wasipe [as] already made known by a chief from Mamprusi called Sonaba; these weapons, we suspect, were being shipped to Janga, ostensibly to be moved to Wasipe to fight, kill and occupy Daboya and its environs,” the chief alleged.

Chief Gbonapewura alleged that the Sonaba recently incited war between his own brethren in Lukula over the siting of a mosque, during which lives were lost and hundreds of people displaced, as part of his agenda to expand his territory and his annexation propaganda before the referendum for the creation of new regions, including the Savanna and the North East regions.

“We do not want to believe that Toibu Abdul-Rahman and his friends have, on several occasions, promised the Tampulma and Mamprusi settlers in North Gonja of Gonjaland that certain personality would help carve out [areas] of North Gonja and add to Mamprugu should the New Patriotic Party (NPP) win the 2016 elections,” the statement from the Wasipe chiefs and people said.

He said Gonjas acquired their vast land by conquest and are still prepared to fight for it on land, water and in the air to maintain every inch without fear.

Gbonapowura Mahama Saakan called on the IGP, the National Security Secretariat and all peace-loving people of the world to speak to this issue of proliferation of offensive weapons and the chanting of war songs by the Sonaba.

The police counter-terrorism unit arrested four suspects believed to have played a role in shipping the 59 AK-47 rifles to Walewale.