POLITICS-UGANDA: Peace Talks With Rebels Stall Over Sudan’s Neutrality

By Evelyn Kiapi Reprint | | Print |

Evelyn Kiapi Matsamura

KAMPALA, Jan 25 2007 (IPS) - At the age of 63, Mama Dorothea Aduk should have been enjoying retirement, and a comfortable life in her village in northern Uganda.

But a long running conflict between rebels of the Lords Resistance Army (LRA), led by former catholic catechist Joseph Kony, and the Ugandan government, turned her into a refugee living in the Acholi Quarters, a suburb of shacks in the east of country’s capital city, Kampala 10 years ago.

Instead of spending time with her grandchildren, telling them the heroic tales of their ancestors, the Acholi tribe of northern Uganda, Mama Aduk slaves in a quarry, breaking stones to earn as little as a dollar a day for dangerous and backbreaking labour.

Hopes of returning to her old home, and the graves of some relatives killed by the rebels, which revived last year with the ceasefire and possible peace agreement between the rebels and the government have faded with the negotiations deadlocked.

Talks, which started in July 2006, in Juba, capital of southern Sudan, did not resume on Jan. 22 as expected. On Jan. 10, the LRA announced it was staying away from the negotiations unless it was moved to a neutral country like Kenya or South Africa, which demand Kampala has rejected.

The rebels said their decision followed recent comments by Sudan’s President Omar El Bashir and his South Sudan counterpart, Salva Kiir Mayardit that the LRA were no longer welcome in southern Sudan. The rebels also complained that the mediator, Riek Macher, the vice president of South Sudan, is biased in favour of Kampala.

The LRA, which wants to establish a government run according to the Biblical 10 commandments, has been seeking to topple the government of President Yoweri Museveni since 1986, a conflict that, according to government statistics, has displaced over 16,000 people from their homes. Some 20,000 children have been abducted to serve as child soldiers, and sex slaves, according to the UN children’s agency, UNICEF.

Political analysts here think the LRA’s attempt to shift the venue was intended to raise the profile of the peace process and their stake in it. They also believe that the talks have been hampered by the outstanding arrest warrant against top rebel commanders issued in 2005 by the International Criminal Court (ICC), based in The Hague.

This came after the Ugandan government asked the ICC in 2003 to collect evidence of crimes committed against humanity by the LRA leadership.

“The future of the talks depends on whether the LRA can be convinced that Juba is still a venue where its main concerns, particularly the ICC warrants can be addressed,” Angelo Izama, a political commentator in Kampala said.

Meanwhile, reports of rebel attacks on travellers have resumed after months of calm in the north. There are also reports that the rebels have started crossing back into Uganda, thus breaching the cessation of hostilities agreement signed on Aug. 26, 2006.

The Ugandan army has said it is ready to defend its citizens by military means. Army spokesman Felix Kulayigye said the army was on high alert to defend the country’s borders from rebel intrusion.

“We are ready. No more LRA rebels will be accepted back in northern Uganda,” he said. The rebels, it is believed, are currently based in unknown positions in southern Sudan.

Thousands of people live in harsh conditions in camps for the internally displaced in northern Uganda. The government launched a ‘Master Plan for Northern Uganda’ in April last year aimed at disbanding the camps and resettling refugees back in their villages, but many Acholis are scared to leave in the absence of a durable peace.

This is not the first time that talks have taken place. Since 1986, when the conflict started, there have been over six attempts to reach peace.

Refugees in the Acholi quarter believe that the only path to peace would be for the LRA to atone for their sins through traditional ways like ‘Mato Oput’, which involves the slaughter of animals and other rituals to enable enemies to be forgiven for their misdeeds.

“Kony and his commanders know they committed atrocities and killed many innocent people. They need to come out and apologise and the people will pardon them. The ICC may not forgive Kony but the Acholi people will,” said Mama Aduk’s son Thomas Akena, 34.

“The talks are taking too long and that is why hope is dying. We hear stories over the radio that the two parties are having disagreements and we feel as if the whole thing is collapsing,” Akena said.

But International Affairs Minister Okello Oryem, a senior member of the government’s negotiation team, said there was no reason for people to lose hope. Abandoning the talks at this juncture would open the door to a resumption of attacks by the LRA, he warned.

“The chances of achieving peace are very high. There are hurdles here and there but we are getting there,” Oryem told IPS.

“I am patient, tolerant and foremost, hopeful. Others should also be so. We cannot achieve peace overnight,” he added. “I am hopeful that at least by April this year, a peace agreement will have been signed.”