- Open Access
Stereotypes, prejudices and exclusion of Fulani pastoralists in Ghana
© Bukari and Schareika. 2015
- Received: 7 July 2015
- Accepted: 6 October 2015
- Published: 4 November 2015
The Erratum to this article has been published in Pastoralism 2015 5:24
The purpose of this paper is to analyze stereotypes and prejudices of Fulani pastoralists as they have become an important part of national and local community policies and discourses. We show how these attitudes have subtly led to Fulani exclusion and discrimination and structured community-pastoralist relations. Typical stereotypes and prejudices of Fulani include Fulani as armed robbers, rapists, violent and uncivilized. We argue that stereotypes, prejudices and practices of Fulani pastoralists’ exclusion go beyond the normal perceptions of them being non-citizens and a non-indigenous ethnic group in Ghana, but have been developed through social cognitive categorization. Our study found that these perceptions have resulted in Fulani pastoralists being denied settlements in communities and the use of and access to resources. Besides, stereotypes and prejudices suffered by Fulani pastoralists are constructed in the community and media discourses and have been built historically and culturally. National and local policies such as national expulsion exercises of Fulani (e.g. Operation Cow Leg), local community evictions and confiscations of Fulani-acquired lands have led to subtle discrimination against them in many spheres of Ghanaian society. The paper uses insights from primary field data of interviews and observations, as well as reference to media and news reports.
- Farmer-herder conflict
In Ghana, tribalism and ethnocentrism have generally been rejected, especially among the so-called indigenous ethnic groups. Yet snapshots of ‘tribalism’ and ‘ethnocentrism’ do exist in Ghana particularly in the body politic, in employment sectors and in relations between autochthonous and allochthonous groups. The Fulani (pastoralists) are regularly ‘victims’ of ethnically-based stereotypes, prejudices and discrimination within Ghanaian society. They are treated as ‘non-citizens’, ‘aliens’ and ‘foreigners’. The Fulani (Fulbe)1 are mainly nomadic and semi-sedentary pastoralists whose occupation is herding cattle. Most often, they cannot claim ownership of the land and natural resources they use as herders. Various Fulani groups inhabit the savannah-Sahel region of West Africa, especially in Nigeria, Niger, Chad, Senegal, Guinea, Mauretania, Mali, Burkina Faso, Benin and Cote d’Ivoire (Turner et al. 2011; Oppong 2002). Apart from herding, there are huge numbers of Fulani engaged in business, trade, manufacture, religious learning and politics. Their population is estimated at 18 million. Nomadic Fulani are often ‘minority groups’, both in terms of power and population in countries where they have come to stay and where their settlements are spatially separated from those of the autochthon population.
The ‘Fulani’ are not one of the recognized ethnic groups2 in Ghana, despite contact with the Ghanaian populace for over a century. With the exception of a few censuses that purposely included and counted Fulani as part of the population of Ghana, their numbers are not known and they are deliberately not registered in the national census. In national elections, second- and third-generation Fulani pastoralists are not allowed to vote, unless locally dominant political parties see them as enhancing their electoral chances. In the National Identification Exercise which was meant to compile a national database and identity cards for both citizen and non-citizens resident in Ghana, Fulani pastoralists were either refused to be registered in some areas or made to pay money by registration officials.3
Thus, at the national and community levels, Fulani pastoralists are excluded from socio-political participation and access to resources. Ghanaian citizenship and immigration policies have tended to put Fulani pastoralists in a negative light. Fulani per the 1992 Republic of Ghana (1992) 