Azaghvana E-Book 2003 - Flipbook - Page 74
side of Dghweɗe could not be extended any further. There was the additional factor that Mafa
from the Moskota side also suffered from chronic land shortage, which led to conflict. One
conflict stemmed from the fact that the Kirawa river migrates, which makes the international
boundary potentially unstable. Another cause was that an increasing number of Mafa from
Cameroon attempted to settle in Barawa due to the suitability of the Barawa land for onion
cultivation. Onion cultivation is highly profitable, which made this land particularly valuable.
Population pressure from the hills of Ghwa’a could only be absorbed in a very limited way by
the resettlement area of Barawa.
The potential for conflict manifested differently in Kwatara, the resettlement area of Korana
Basa. The originally designated resettlement area of Kwatara was originally limited to the
foothills area of Hambagda, but due to ongoing population pressure from the hills, people
from Korana Basa also settled in Vile. Because the Vile people had been settled in the
western plain for much longer than the Dghweɗe, they claimed that the Dghweɗe had started
to settle outside their designated resettlement area. This was disputed by the Dghweɗe, who
counterclaimed that the original settlement area was larger in the first place. As a result of this
conflict, a court case between Vile and Korana Basa was ongoing during my time. The issue
was that the village head of Korana Basa allegedly collected taxes from Dghweɗe families
outside the designated resettlement area. The main underlying reason for the expansion of the
resettling Dghweɗe was that the Vile people were a fairly small group but controlled a
comparably large portion of arable land. Although the Vile appeared quite happy for the
Dghweɗe of Korana Basa to settle and farm outside the original resettlement area, they still
wanted to collect the taxes themselves. I do not know whether the conflict was eventually
resolved, but it does illustrate that conflict over land in the western plain did not necessarily
occur due to lack of land, but had more to do with original owners of land and to whom taxes
should be paid. Considering that the population density in the western plain was generally
lower, such conflicts were taken to court to find a solution to the ongoing population pressure
from the Dghweɗe massif.
Since there was no international boundary in the western plain, land belonging to the Gwoza
LGA stretches quite far westwards, though this did not necessarily mean that all groups of the
hills had equal access to it. This was a problem not only for the Dghweɗe, but also for the
Chikiɗe and Chinene, as well as the Gvoko. While the Dghweɗe bordered the plains at both
sides of the hills, Ghwa’a in the east and Korana Basa in the west, Chikiɗe and Chinene and
Gava (Gava is part of Guduf) only had access to the intramountainous eastern plains, and the
Gvoko only to the western plain. This meant that they had only access to the plains on the
side of the mountains where their hill settlements were found. The further one gets to the
north on either side of the Gwoza hills, the easier it seemed for groups of the hills to settle in
the plains. As mentioned above, the Zelidva for example had already almost completely
abandoned their settlements in the hills decades ago, and conflict over resettlement land
seemed to have been much less of an issue there.
Conclusion and orientational map of the wider region
This chapter has shown that the Gwoza hills had already significantly changed by the time I
started working there in 1994. We realise that something very new took root in the hills,
something that hinted towards a qualitative turnaround, and was linked to the introduction of
radical Islam. That I became aware of that change only in 2005 does not mean it was only
then that it all began, but shows also that it somehow coincided with a generational change. A
new generation of Dghweɗe grew up in the aftermath of the September attacks of 2001 and
the subsequent 'war on terror' led by the US and other western powers. The overall religious
climate in Nigeria was affected by this and it appeared to be connected to the spread of Izala
Islam. However this was far from being something entirely new, since there had been a
previous history of Islamic sectarianism, as the Hamman Yaji case will tell us later.
72
