Northern Uganda -Nasty Legacy

By James Abola

Dear Friend
In 1996 my employers transferred me from Gulu to Kampala. When I got to Kampala I joined a group of young people who met regularly to pray. Being fresh from Gulu I regularly brought the conflict in northern Uganda as a prayer item but it always met with lukewarm interest. I have thought long and hard about this matter and the only conclusion I can come to is that many people do not know the real picture of what has been going on in northern Uganda for the past 20 years. I have taken the liberty to share with you the little I know about the pain going on in Northern Uganda in the hope that it will encourage you to take positive action to lessen or better still overcome the plight of “those people.”

Since Mr Olara Otunnu, the former UN Secretary General’s Special Representative for Children opened the debate on a genocidal programme in northern Uganda, many people have jumped into the fray. Olara’s first volley was fired during the November 2004 Sydney Peace Prize lecture when he said “As we meet here today to focus on the fate of children being destroyed in situations of war, I must draw your attention to the worst place on earth to be a child today. That place is the northern region of the Republic of Uganda.”

After the serialisation of the lecture by the Daily Monitor Newspaper Otunnu had a radio debate with General David Tinyefuza on the genocide question. Since then many people have jumped into the fray with those defending the government including a European Union MP named Hecke, a Kenyan freelance journalist and the army spokesman. Mr Otunu has now taken his debate to London where he debated with Mr Okello Oryem, a junior foreign affairs minister in Uganda.

What pains the government defenders most is the allegation that there is a deliberate plan by Mr Museveni and his associates to wipe out the Acholi and the Langi. According to them, responsibility for the long suffering of the people in northern Uganda must be laid squarely at the feet of the LRA.

That the LRA have committed gruesome atrocities against the people of northern Uganda is not indispute. That the LRA war is not a popular war supported by the people of Acholi should not also be in dispute. That the LRA do not have the capacity or intent to bring down the Uganda government is not in dispute either. What is in dispute is that the actions and utterances of government officials in the past 20 years (Otunnu looks back to 35 years) raise many questions.

When the government ordered people in Acholi to go into the Internally Displaced People (IDP) camps some 10 years ago it was ostensibly to protect them from the rebel attacks and to ensure a quick victory over the rebels. In addition the government put in place policies to ensure security of persons and property; access to medical care; provision of safe water and resettlement.

The Health and mortality survey among internally displaced persons in Gulu, Kitgum and Pader districts, northern Uganda conducted by the Uganda Government Ministry of Health and other agencies report a woeful failure on the part of government. Although the study only covered a 7 months period it makes chilling reading.

The report says “Our study demonstrates convincingly that the 1.2 million displaced persons living in camps in the Acholi region of Northern Uganda are experiencing a very serious humanitarian emergency, undoubtedly among the very worst in the world today, and possibly the most neglected by international media and the relief community.” Some of these convincing findings include:
That both the crude mortality rate (CMR) and under five mortality rate (U5MR) are well above emergency levels. In other words more people are dying in Acholi than even the usually high death rate expected when there is an emergency.
That the excess death in the IDP camps in Acholi during the period January to July 2005 was 1000 people per week. This is excess death not actual death which is definitely higher. That means that in one year (52 weeks) 52,000 excess people would die in the Acholi IDP Camps. If one considers that the conflict has been going on for 20 years and use a factor of 10 years then it translates to 520,000 excess death for Acholi alone.
Malaria and AIDS are the leading causes of self reported deaths followed by violence. Meaning that even when the people are better protected in the camp malaria and AIDS still wipes them off! While Uganda is boasting of 6% HIV prevalence, Acholi’s prevalence rate is on the higher side of 30%.
On average the people in Acholi require 2.7 hours to collect water. No wonder most households have less than 15 litres of water per day for each member.

In the face of such depressing statistics it is difficult to understand the comments by many government officials that the LRA is a small problem. Because that means that the plight of the Acholi and other communities that bear the brunt of this insurgency means nothing to such officials.

Although the government has stated its responsibilities towards the IDPs in a policy paper, actions have been greatly lacking. As a result the protected camps have become death camps. To appreciate the insensitivity of the ruling elite one has to only listen to adverts extolling a candidate who stopped the killings in Luwero. The question is how comes this champion has not stopped the killings of Acholi in almost 20 years?

While the likes of Hecke continue to bash Otunnu and fail to see or hear any evil, a lasting but nasty legacy is being built in Northern Uganda. It is time that the deafening silence on the northern question turned into an uproar. There is a Luo saying that “odo ma ogoyo nyeki pe ikano” meaning that you do not hide the stick that has been used to beat your co-wife. In the past few years the stick of protected peoples camps and the attendant sufferings has spread from Acholi to Lango and Teso.

Thank you for reading up to this point.