Shani Bawumia Chastises former President Mahama over divisive Bawku comments

A leading member of the NPP in the North East Region Dr. Shani Abubakari Bawumia has chastised former President John Dramani Mahama for downgrading the population size of North East Region over the Bawku enclave.

The 2024 Presidential Candidate of the NDC at a durbar in Bawku said, he will support the people of Bawku to have their own region, reiterating that, in terms of people population the Bawku enclave is more than North East Region, the Region of the NPP 2024 Presidential Candidate, Dr. Alhaji Mahamadu Bawumia. Again , Mr. Mahama emphasizes that, the landmass size of the Bawku area is also comparable to that of the North East Region.
“…now if you look at North East I think the people in the Bawku area here in these 6 constituencies I think the population is probably more than North East .,..I don’t have the figures and if you look at the land size …the land size is comparable to the land size of North East”. He said amidst applause
But Dr. Shani Bawumia speaking to the media hinted that, the former President Mahama was very divisive in his comments noting that comparing the population size of the North East Region and the 6 constituencies in the Bawku enclave sort to create divisiveness and further deepened the security situation in Bawku.
He noted that, the NDC Presidential Candidate did not get his facts right but peddle falsehood just to please the people of Bawku, adding that, the comparison made by Mr. Mahama between North East Region and the Bawku enclave on population size at the durbar was needless.
” First of all, the North East Region is bigger than the Upper East Region in terms of land size. The North East covers a total of 9,070 km² while the Upper East Region covers a total land size of 8,842 km² . On population, the Upper East Region has a total population of about 1.3 million people while the North East Region is approximately 700.000 people. So clearly, Mr. Mahama was up to something” he said
The NPP member noted that, even the land size of Mamprugu Mo’aduri district and West Mamprusi Municipality in the North East Region alone is bigger than the entire Bawku enclave, ” the six districts in the Bawku area together covers a total land size of 4,374 km² while Mamprugu Mo’aduri and West Mamprusi alone covers 4,892km²”.
Dr. Shani noted that, there is nothing wrong with creating a region for the Bawku enclave out of the Upper East Region but unfortunately ” Mr. Mahama is manipulation people’s emotioms just to gain the Presidency,and that is very dangerous especially in Bawku. He (John Mahama)is exploiting the of the tosow division anf gain power”.

Former President John Dramani Mahama speech at the durber:
“Your member of parliament has written a letter to the speaker I am aware requesting that another region should be created out of the Upper East Region to cover the six constituencies in the Bawku area …Bawku Naaba raised it with me and I told him in principle I think it is a good idea for two reasons, one …for reason of bringing government closer to the people and that is the principal reason for which we create new regions and new districts and the second reason is for security… Bawku is a special security zone because of the issues that has been happening here so it will be a good proposal to have a region so that it can be a focus to make sure that we deal with the security issues as well as we can….. And so I don’t think it is out of place because the criteria are dependent on population , they are dependent on land size and they are dependent on economic viability….. now if you look at North East I think the people in the Bawku area here in these 6 constituencies I think the population is probably more than North East .,..I don’t have the figures and if you look at the land size …the land size is comparable to the land size of North East …if you look at the economic viability Bawku is a major trading and commercial centre and so it qualifies on all the three grounds so I told my father that there are some constitutional provisions that we need to look at ….there are some requirements that we need to satisfy and that is first a petition must be submitted to the President of the country and the President of the country must setup a commission of enquiry…. commission of enquiry must look at the petition and do a feasibility study and ensure that it is viable to have a region and then after that it have to go a referendum and so those are the constitutional requirements that needs to be gone through but you can be sure that you have my support and I feel that yes it is justify that we have a region here ….in the Bawku area”.