Chiefs and people of Apinto Divisional Area at the press conference
Chieftaincy disputes in the Wassa Fiase Traditional Area in the Western Region have hampered development in the area.
Members of the Apinto Divisional Area, which is under the Wassa Fiase Traditional Council, who revealed this, expressed dissatisfaction with the unnecessary protracted chieftaincy disputes in the traditional council.
According to the Apinto Divisional Council, there are currently three claimants to the paramountcy of the Wassa Fiase Traditional area.
They include Odeneho Akrofa Krukoko II, Osagyefo Kwamena Enimil VI and an Acting President of the Traditional Council.
“The reckless action from some litigation happy chiefs and elders of Wassa Fiase Traditional Council will no doubt affect the peace, stability and development of not only the people of Apinto Division but all sons and daughters of the traditional council,” the Apinto chiefs stated.
The Apinto chiefs have therefore appealed to the Chieftaincy Ministry to relocate the seat of Wassa Fiase Traditional Council from Tarkwa to Benso, where the Council was previously located in the region by December 31, 2016.
“We believe that the relocation of the traditional council to Benso where the Wassa Fiase Black Stool is also located would help to bring peace to the traditional area,” they stated.
They revealed that Tarkwa, which had been the political and administrative capital of the Tarkwa-Nsuaem Municipality, is under the Apinto Divisional Council with the traditional seat at Awudua.
“With immediate effect neither the Wassa Fiase Traditional Council nor any of its aspirant chiefs should organize meeting of any kind in Tarkwa or any place within the Apinto Divisional Area. Whoever flouts the warning does so at his own peril,” they stressed.
Addressing a press conference in Tarkwa, the Gyasehene of the Apinto Divisional Council Nana Dr Adarkwa Bediako III, disclosed that the relocation of the traditional council to Benso would serve as catalyst in resolving the myriad of problems in the traditional area.
He explained that about three decades ago, one Opanyin Amihere Agyilha, the then family head of the Benso Omanhene, decided to become the Omanhene.
“Agyilha was highly desirous to occupy the stool and so he decided to organize some influential chiefs in the Traditional Council and succeeded in convincing them to move the seat of the traditional council from Benso to Tarkwa,” he added.
“The relocation of the seat from Benso to Tarkwa was accepted in the spirit of unity and prosperity in the Wassa Fiase Traditional and the development of Tarkwa Township.”
He pointed out that there has been chaos in Wassa Fiase Traditional Council after the transfer of the seat.
“Tarkwa has been recording chieftaincy disputes involving the traditional council which has not allowed Municipal Chief Executives to plan and execute meaningful development projects in the area.”
The negative effects of litigation on the development of any town cannot be over emphasized and as traditional custodian of the Tarkwa Township, we, the Apinto chiefs, disassociate ourselves from the litigations, he added.
He said that the Apinto chiefs would not allow Tarkwa to be used for traditional conquest.
“As peace lovers, we, the chiefs and people of Apinto, want to purge ourselves of fruitless, reckless, destructive and unproductive chieftaincy disputes which have far-reaching consequences,” he indicated.
From Emmanuel Opoku, Tarkwa