Building sustainable peace in Northern Uganda

By Sverker Finnström and Ronald R. Atkinson

May 5, 2008 — The peace process to end the 22-year war in northern Uganda is at an uncertain, perilous juncture. Brokered by the semi-autonomous Government of South Sudan (GoSS), nearly two years of contentious, complex negotiations have produced a comprehensive peace agreement signed by delegations from the Government of Uganda (GoU) and the rebel Lord’s Resistance Army/Movement (LRA/M). On 10 April, LRA/M leader Joseph Kony was to have added his signature, and four days later, President Museveni was to have done the same. In confused circumstances reflecting serious divisions both between and within the rebel delegation and fighters – including the firing of David Matsanga, the top rebel negotiator, and rumours of internal fighting that may have led to the death of Kony’s second-in-command, Okot Odhiambo – Kony did not sign.

As some of the clouds cleared, Kony appointed the deputy leader, James Obita, as new head of the delegation. Kony also invited leaders and elders from Uganda for a meeting now in May, in which he wants to discuss the contested issues of restorative and retributive justice. Parallel to this, however, media reports claim fresh LRA abductions in Sudan and the Congo. And a final agreement remains in abeyance.

This is certainly disappointing, with serious potential consequences. However, Kony’s request for more time to clarify the “traditional” and legal proceedings that he and his fighters face, as well as the signs of internal dissension among the LRA/M (often linked to questions surrounding Matsanga), make the current delay in Kony’s final signing of the peace agreement not entirely surprising.

It is also important to note that Kony’s failure to sign does not necessarily mean that LRA activities in northern Uganda will resume. Most LRA fighters are simply too far away from north-central Uganda for this to be a viable option, and unless South Sudan descends into renewed chaos and violence, the LRA will unlikely be able to reestablish bases there.

At the same time, however, diplomats and others in the international community need to make every effort to get the talks back on track, as well as keep the GoU from initiating any military moves. There are innumerable reasons for this, but among the most important is that the failure to fully ratify the peace agreement will give the GoU an excuse – as they can blame this on the rebels – for abandoning the many serious commitments they have signed up for in the current agreement. Such abandonment, would it occur, will make real peace and reconstruction of the north unlikely, even impossible.

The most wide-ranging of these commitments are included in Agenda Items 2 and 3 in the agreement. Agenda Item 2, on “comprehensive solutions,” addresses not only specific rebel concerns such as integrating former LRA fighters into the army, but also broader issues such as inclusive and democratic governance, assessing and remedying regional disparities in government institutions, assisting peoples’ voluntary and secure return from the internally displaced persons’ camps, and implementing recovery programmes for northern Uganda. Agenda Item 3 on accountability and reconciliation is equally far-reaching. It identifies a combination of local and national justice mechanisms – already in place or to be instituted – to promote reconciliation and address issues of accountability for wrongs committed by both rebel and state actors – with indications that it was hoped that this combination of mechanisms might induce the International Criminal Court (ICC) to suspend its arrest warrants against the indicted rebel commanders.

The tabling of all of these far-reaching issues by the rebel delegation, and the success in getting them incorporated into a peace agreement signed by the GoU, have been crucial achievements of the peace process. Local political grievances have finally been given attention as national political grievances.

Yet some say this is not enough, and throughout the talks, there have been tensions within the rebel delegation, and also among its supporters. Some, such as Matsanga, the former head of delegation, have pushed for a speedy process, while others feel frustrated, claiming that the root causes of the war have not been given sufficient and proper attention. To be sure, addressing root causes has not been in the interest of the GoU.

To whatever extent the absence of an examination of root causes of the war will hamper or limit the long-term sustainability of the peace process, the rebel delegation’s achievement in including Agenda Items 2 and 3 is noteworthy, and was accomplished against pressure from all sides – the GoU, the GoSS mediators, and the international community – not to pursue such broad initiatives.

The rebel success in doing so is not only surprising, but also paradoxical. Even if the LRA/M has been building a political platform ever since the talks began, many Ugandans, including those in the north, would hesitate to conclude that the LRA/M is a legitimate representative of their grievances with the Ugandan government. The lived complexities of the situation are well captured by Norbert Mao, a northern politician who throughout the years of war has been an outspoken critic of the GoU. “We in northern Uganda also have our grievances against the LRA just as we have issues to sort out with the Uganda government,” Mao said in a recent interview. “But we can not denounce a good idea simply because it is coming from the LRA. If the LRA says northern Uganda is not well represented in decision-making organs of the Uganda government, if it is true it is true.”

As we wait for the current situation to be resolved, and a final agreement signed, we would like to stress that successfully implementing the agreement will be an arduous, grassroots project that will require the sustained attention and support of the outside world. A so-called “post-conflict situation” can often be more violent than a conflict itself, and we need to be prepared, emotionally and practically, for problems and setbacks. It is essential to acknowledge that a peace agreement must be won over and over again, on an everyday basis, in people’s everyday lives, as the difficult and often painful experiences of Palestine and Northern Ireland demonstrate.

Therefore, it is not cynicism but the recognition of these complex lived realities that led one of our long-term fieldwork associates to describe the upcoming reconstruction of northern Uganda as “a new war [that] has just started.” The lucrative business of war may easily turn, for a privileged few, into an equally lucrative business of peace, rather than into a peaceful life for the masses. Indeed, throughout the war, the problem on the ground has not really been the lack of international funds, but rather a lack of opportunity for the Ugandan citizenry to hold either international organizations or their own government accountable for the uses and misuses of such funds. The international community, with its uncritical support of Museveni’s government and, since 2001, its global “war on terror,” has failed most Ugandans in the war-zone, who feel that they are denied many of the most mundane and everyday aspects of citizenship that we in the West take for granted. They feel excluded from Uganda’s wider developments, and even the country’s future. Sustainable peace and reconstruction in northern Uganda will require that people there be reintegrated with the rest of the country, and feel that this is the case.

Implementing the peace agreement already signed by representatives of the LRA/M and GoU and reintegrating the people of northern Uganda back into the country as a whole are just two of many challenges facing post-war Uganda. Meaningful reconstruction and sustainable peace will also require that government and aid agencies listen to people in the war-torn north, and then respond to peoples’ expressed needs with major – and expensive – economic and infrastructural development. Public trust will have to be rebuilt, basic physical security, devastatingly absent for so long, will have to be re-established, and perhaps most important of all, security of tenure and access to land will be absolutely crucial.

Each of these issues on its own (and there are more) pose daunting challenges for post-war Uganda. Taken together, the problems are bigger than merely having them listed and addressed one by one. Rather, the problems that post-war Uganda faces form a complex reality in which past and future grievances cross-breed with one another. For example, the many years of experienced marginalisation in northern Uganda often breed even deeper feelings of marginalisation, and tensions and concerns over land often breed more tensions and conflicts. More importantly, however, such feelings and tensions cross-breed in complex ways.

Here we only have space to discuss briefly one of these problems – concerns over land access and security. Especially in Acholi, the epicentre of the war with the largest percentage of people displaced, most people have still not felt enough sense of security to leave the camps into which they were forced by the government to move and, until recently, to stay. In the camps today, there might be breathing space, but no peace of mind. Many Acholi are worried about whether or not they will regain access to their land once they leave the camps. Such worries are exacerbated by a myriad of related concerns: the many years of forced displacement and absence off the land; the passing of knowledgeable and respected elders after so many years of war; the unprecedented numbers of widows and orphans; the heated public debate over the future of Acholi land being conducted in the newspapers and elsewhere; strong central government pressure, most notably from the President, to alienate 40.000 acres of land for a private sugar plantation; and the establishment already of other large-scale commercial farming ventures on communal Acholi land, sometimes protected by the Ugandan army.

Unfortunately, the combination of a mass of Acholi people debilitated by war, displacement, and extreme poverty; a weak, underdeveloped civil society; an under-resourced local government; a central government that often appears disinterested or even malevolent towards Acholi; and powerful interests seeking to obtain land for large-scale, commercial farming could easily produce new conflicts. A crucial first step in reducing that risk is a moratorium on any alienation of communal land for “investment” or “development” until people are peacefully resettled. Acholi parliamentarians, cultural and other civil society organizations and leaders, and local government leaders have frequently reiterated this position.

Such a moratorium could provide an increased sense of security that could limit conflicts as people leave camps and begin reestablishing sustainable livelihoods, a crucial component in reconstructing northern Uganda and building – however difficult – a sustainable peace. To whatever degree this process is successful, it could generate a positive cross-breeding that would lessen, rather than accelerate, the many interrelated problems facing post-war northern Uganda.

Sverker Finnström is a lecturer in anthropology at Stockholm University. He is the author of Living with Bad Surroundings: War, History, and Everyday Moments in Northern Uganda (Duke University Press).

Ronald R. Atkinson teaches history and directs the African Studies Program at the University of South Carolina. He is the author of The Origins of the Acholi (Fountain Press) and coauthor of Traditional Ways of Coping in Acholi: Cultural Provisions for Reconciliation and Healing from War (Caritas Gulu, Uganda).