Guinea-Bissau President Umaro Sissoko Embalo called this Wednesday for dialogue instead of “fratricidal battles that could end in death” to resolve conflicts over control of traditional authority in the Biombo region, in the northeast of the country.
Sissoko Embalo received at the Presidential Palace in Bissau a group of elders from the region, inhabited mainly by members of the Pepel ethnic group, known for their recourse to ancestral practices of community control.
In recent days, several localities in the Biombo region have witnessed episodes of clashes between people over the control of traditional authority, to the extent that Interior Minister Adiato Nandinha had to travel there to calm the situation.
In the Bigimita community, there have been cases of death threats among candidates for the position of regulo, the traditional leader of the community.
The President of Guinea, who stressed that he is not involved in the election campaign, called on the elders present in the palace to do everything to avoid such situations.
“I ask you to discuss who should be the head of the community, but not to kill each other because of traditional authority. If you have differences, call me if necessary,” Umaro Sissoko Embalo said.
Guinea’s president has said it “would be a shame” for members of the Ash ethnic group if disputes over traditional authority one day led to the deaths of people from the community.
The head of state called on all members of the ethnic group to see themselves in the example of Guinea-Bissau’s late President João Bernardo “Niño” Vieira, insisting: “Don’t quarrel among yourselves over Bolanhas.” ‘or something else’.
“We should be like the late President ‘Nino’ Vieira, who, despite being from the Ashes ethnic group by birth, never wanted to consider himself the same as the Ashes. He considered himself a true son” of Guinea-Bissau, he said Sissoko Embalo.
According to the President of the Republic, Guinea-Bissau is “destined for all nationalities.”