Living in protracted communal conflict: Socioeconomic trends and household poverty in Ghana's Yendi area

Abstract

Motivation: The conflict in Yendi, which dates to the colonial period, was one of the major sources of conflict in northern Ghana. The conflict was partly attributed to the contention on whether it is a convention that succession to the Yendi throne must essentially rotate between the two warring royal factions or revert to the primogenital tradition of unilateral royal family succession to the Ya Na Skin. Purpose: This article provides a critical synthesis of the impact of communal conflict on household poverty and economic empowerment of the poor to achieve decent standards of living in Ghana's Yendi area. It is therefore necessary to answer the research question, what is the impact of the Yendi communal conflict on socioeconomic trends and household poverty?. Methods: We aimed to ascertain the impact of the Yendi conflict on 20 local government officials, NGO representatives, traders, parents, teachers, students, farmers, nurses, members of the traditional authority and security personnel. The average age of participants was 35. Unstructured interviews were conducted with key informants using in-depth interview techniques to gather the necessary data and purposively sampled across Ghana's Yendi. Interviews were recorded, transcribed using a framework approach. Results: The article finds that families that were rich in landed assets and had sufficient income but were most impacted by the conflict have seen their economic conditions deteriorate. This study further reveals that conflict impacts negatively on the welfare of families in different ways. Families endowed with more assets and higher education are identified as having better capacity to withstand economic shocks. Conclusion: There is a need for agricultural industrialization to offer spin-offs and the generation of backward and forward linkages. To create strong linkages within the agriculture industry, it must become a resourceful business environment that offers a steady supply of quality raw materials at low costs. Government must help transform the rural environment from its subsistence structure to a commercially appealing, feasible and active sector, one which is critical for the accomplishment of sustained equitable growth.