Karamoja disarmament gets underway amid uncertainty

The Ugandan government has embarked on a serious Karamoja disarmament programme, exactly one year after the failed initial disarmament was abandoned at the height of increased Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) incursions in the north.

While drumming up communities' support and officially launching the disarmament programme on the 28th of September 2004 at a rally in Moroto, Boma Ground,'Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni assured the Karimojong communities that the government would secure their security and safety by providing enough security personnel along their porous and troublesome borders with Kenya and Sudan.

Speaking at the rally, the President, stressed that the Karamoja disarmament must take place whether tribes in neighbouring countries are disarmed or not. He said that he would not tolerate what is referred to as "Democratic Sickness" of allowing unconstitutional practices to pertain in parts of Uganda because they exist in other countries. This democratic sickness and unconstitutional practices that Museveni was referring to is nothing other than intercommunity cattle rustling in northern Kenya and southern Sudan.

Museveni made it clear that Kampala would treat any attack on Ugandans as a foreign invasion on Ugandan by "foreign armed groups" and would be met by full might of the Ugandan People Defense Force (UPDF). ""The government does not know anything like cattle rustling/raids, any attack on our people would be met by the full strength of our force", the president said amid applause.

The president further said that his appeal to the neighbouring countries to have a joint, concurrent and coordinated regional disarmament programme has fallen on deaf ears, and he has decided to do it alone for illicit arms have continued to take toll on Ugandans lives, displaced thousands, widowed women, orphaned children, disrupted provision of social services and greatly contributed to the underdevelopment of the Karamoja region.

Analyzed carefully, this turn of events would definitely strain Nairobi-Kampala diplomatic relations for the Kenyan Pokot and Turkana have been in constant but intermittent militarized cattle related conflicts with the Uganda's Karimojong.

This phenomenon is in total disregard of the current efforts to integrate the Eastern African countries. What is of critical importance is for the regional leadership to pursue efforts and initiatives that are likely to bring the East African communities together, for solutions to their problems are inherent to these communities themselves, instead of engaging in those activities that are likely to drive a wedge not only between the communities in the respective states but also between the greater horn of Africa countries.

But if it is true that indeed the leaders of the respective greater horn of Africa states particularly Kenya have frustrated regional coordinated and concurrent disarmament programme as claimed by Museveni, then we should not squarely blame the Ugandan leader but instead demand from the other leaders an explanation on why they don't want to support initiatives that are likely to bring peace in this troubled region.

Available data indicate that there are well over 200,000 arms in the hands of North Western communities in Kenya. On the other hand, statistics put illicit arms in Karamoja region at between 50,000 to 150,000. This data suggests that firearms in civilian hands far outnumber those at the hands of formal security forces in the region. For instance, how can Kenya's 34,000 strong men Police force confront 66,000-armed Turkana warriors? Such assortments of firearms in the hands of communities pose a great threat to the regional integration, security and political stability.

It is also important to note that most of these communities do not know nor recognize the national boundaries due to their migratory lifestyle in search of water and pasture for their livestock. The Pokot are found in Kenya and Uganda and it would be unfair to restrict Kenyan or Ugandan Pokot in accessing grazing resources in either side of the border simply because they are "foreign groups".

The Karamoja disarmament programme, which would inevitably result to further violence and considerable human rights abuses has been justified by the Government and the donor community as a result of the prevailing post September 11th discourses which associate failed and failing states such as those in North- East Africa with the proliferation of terrorist activities. The Ugandan government also alleges that its control over the region will assure security and thus open up prospects for profitable foreign investments in the form of gold-mining.

As it stands, the current programme will achieve neither peace nor stability, but is more likely to result in the genocide of the Karamojong people in addition to severing diplomatic relations and ethnicity in the region.