HISTORY
Uganda
is a land locked country located in East Africa. It’s a multi cultural
country with 57 different ethnic groupings. 90% of the 24.7 million people
are Christians, 4% Moslems and the rest animists. Life expectancy has
dropped from 52 in 1991 to 42 at the end of 2004 due to high levels of
HIV/AIDS, malaria and other killers.
Establishing
peace and security in Uganda has eluded every government since
independence in 1962 as each one has tried to create a unified state out
of a collection of ethnic groups. Insurgents have remained active in
northern, western and eastern Uganda.
The
government’s dual policy of military pacification and offers of
unconditional amnesty to recalcitrant rebels have failed to end the
fighting.
Internal
population displacements have increased in the last three years arising
from a series of violent conflicts. Ethnic clashes between the
Banyoro-Bakiga in Kibaale District in the west of the country,
Ayivu-Aringa ethnic rows in the north, Jopadhola, Iteso and Banyole in the
east, the Karimojong, Iteso, Sabiny and Pokot in the northeast,
Batooro-Bakonjo
in the west are some of the few mentioned. Anti government risings and
terrorism with specific reference to the Lords Resistance Army (LRA),
characterized by its ferocious brutality against civilians, which has
displaced over 1.6 million abducting between 25.000-30000 children. The
Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), Alice Lakwena Holy Spirit Movement (HSM)
and Popular Resistance Army (PRA) all based on religious fundamentalism
and extremism have worsened the provision of education, healthcare and
income generating activities whilst complicating the problems of HIV/AIDS,
Human rights abuses, child soldiers and psychological disability.
The
predominant inclination of viewing the rising tide of internal
displacement of populations as a fault of the state and actions of those
that run it has complicated the work of groups involved with factors like
human rights violations, poor policy choices, political instability, poor
social and welfare provisioning.
According
to UN Guiding Principals on Internal Displacement (1998), “Internally
Displaced Persons (IDPs) are persons who have been forced or obliged to
flee or to leave their homes or their places of habitual residences in
particular as a result of or in order to avoid the effects of armed
conflicts, situations of generalized violence, violations of human rights
or natural or human made disasters and who have not crossed an
internationally recognized state border.”
A
range of factors have contributed to the growing conflict and these can be
classified under:
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Typography and Ethnography
The
Northwestern area of the country is largely arid and semi-arid which is
500 metres above the general plain and runs the entire length of the
northeastern border. The area is dominated by a number of ranges. It is
well suited for pastoralism and runs through a number of mainly pastoral
communities including the Sebei, Teso, Pokot, Luhya and Karimojong and
covers three districts of Nakapiripirit (largely occupied by the Pian, Upe
and Pokot clans of the Karimojong), Kotido and Moroto (predominantly
occupied by the Jie and Matheniko respectively).
In
the southwestern parts of the country land pressures in Kigezi and
Bufumbira areas have forced the Bakiga and Bafumbira communities to
migrate to sparsely populated areas of Bunyoro in Kibaale district.
Increased pressures on land and water on the Nkore and Hima communities
have also forced the pastoralist communities to migrate in search for
greener pastures.
These
movements coupled to rural-urban migrations have not only caused tensions
as a result of pressures on land but have also been exacerbated by
political pressures on the local politicians who view themselves losing
out on the electorate as a result of differing ethnic groups hence sow
seeds on violence.
q
Historical and Cultural Backgrounds
Livestock
ownership has always been a way of life rather than simply an economic
activity by the pastoral tribes in the country. Traditionally, migration
in search of water and pasture has been part of the seasoned pattern of
activity. With increasing pressures on land, these movements by
pastoralists can not be accommodated by non pastoralist communities who
are agriculturalist and who accuse the former of poor land use methods.
Pastoralism
has further been traditionally a labour intensive process that kept
children and young men actively engaged on a full time basis. Traditional
cattle raiding in some communities while often involving violence is part
of the ritual process by which young men in the community proved that they
were ready and initiated to manhood. Cattle have always been regarded as
the main means of paying for bride price and accumulation of livestock
reflects not just growing wealth but also increased personal status.
Devastating
combinations of rinderpest, anthrax and cattle raiding in some areas, have
considerably reduced cattle and manifested into violent conflicts
New
factors that have exacerbated conflict in pastoral communities are the
commercialization of raiding of cattle, access to small arms through
increased proliferation processes from both turbulent neighborhoods and
support of insurgent groups. The abetting of the process by both
businessmen and politicians has made the conflict complicated. Emergence
of armed bands and warlords, gender roles under the growing pressures
praising men who get involved in cattle raids have compounded the
conflicts further. Cases of in discriminatory retaliatory responses
through mob attacks to innocent civilians in revenge of past violence and
the application of state machinery in some cases have been viewed as
machinations of state power and have only increased tensions and
resentment.
Policies
pursued by successive postcolonial governments have failed to reduce the
maginalisation of communities. There have been tendencies to neglect the
needs of various communities especially by those ruling communities
thereby failing to mainstream peace for national development.
A
major concern of policy and legislation since independence has been the
regulation and the orderly use of land. The ratio of land to the
population has continuously deteriorated. Accelerating privatization of
land has fuelled growing insecurity not only in pastoral communities but
also in agricultural and urban areas.
The
post independence period has seen further weakening of traditional
governance institutions through a failure to recognize the role of
institutions in management at community levels and partly due to changing
property rights regimes.
These
scourge of conflicts conducted without limits and restraints result in
barbaric violence against innocent children and women. The targeting and
utilization of children as instruments of war has resulted into a crisis
of values. Ugandans must therefore take the lead in managing their
conflicts so that discord between groups and nations does not result in
violence.
The
prevention of conflict through community participation is in line with
civilianisation programmes of military functions in sub-Saharan Africa.
Privatisation of government activities has been a major activity in many
countries with an ongoing debate on privatization and outsourcing of the
military and its functions of peace keeping, internal security,
surveillance and natural resource protection and rescue.
The
strategic focus for Network for Peace-Building Initiatives with its
partners is to carry out research on conflicts in communities in Uganda
and generate generic solutions and skills to peace building activities
through broad based community support programmes.
Peace
initiatives revolve along building empathy, and solidarity to develop
skills that promote human rights in line with the Convention on Rights of
the Child and the Universal Declaration for Human Rights. Also, through
promoting identity, expression, well-being in the family and community and
advocating for appropriate laws for development.
Peace
mainstreaming will be achieved through advocacy and networking to identify
relevant platforms of action and planning for specific needs for peace at
all levels within all sectors in the country with the ultimate goal of
equity. This is intended to lead to a peace mainstreaming policy document
for different sectors and the development of programmes of work or action
plans and development of peace training manuals.
Through
stakeholder consultations, we are focused on affording opportunities for
discussion of all new and relevant policy initiatives and building
consensus and dialogue with a commitment of staff, time, financial
resources and institutional procedures for peace concerns.
