THE BASSA AND EGBURA CONFLICT: CHALLENGES TO DEMOCRATIC GOVERNMENT

Perhaps the most serious challenge both to the consolidation of new democracies and the health of well-established ones is posed by the problem of ethnic conflicts. In societies where communal contenders predominate, political power at the centre is often based on shifting inter-group coalitions. This has profound effects on the collective identity of the affected community/communities. And from all indications, the post-colonial stales in Africa inherited the most essential features of the colonial state. Thus aspects of these unenviable colonial heritages, like apparitions, rear their heads and intermittently erupt into discordant social, political and even economic upheavals. In Nigeria, the pomp and pageantry that accompanied the Fourth Republic democratic era in May 1999 for instance, have been punctuated by violent conflicts, leaving thousands dead, injured and homeless. Why is the country experiencing such communal violence in a democratic setting in which citizens have avenues for seeking redress and correcting the ills? This is because of the continued reluctance in policy and unwillingness of most post-colonial governments in Africa and indeed in the area of our study to honestly address the ills of the past, thus (he incessant seemingly unintractable conflicts. This paper therefore seeks to unveil the roots of one of such protracted communal conflicts in To to Local Government Area of Nasarawa State, Nigeria with a view to proffer a lasting resolution of the conflict.