Ogenga Latigo: FDC will end the Kony war

Written by DEVAPRIYO DAS

Monday, 25 May 2009 05:35

The rolling hills and verdant plains of northern Uganda retain their stark beauty, but its inhabitants have been unquestionably altered by two decades of horrific massacres, mass abduction, conscription of child soldiers, sexual slavery, and most enduringly, the forced displacement of civilians into squalid camps. DEVAPRIYO DAS spoke to the Leader of Opposition in Parliament and MP for Agago County in Pader, Prof. OGENGA LATIGO, about the region’s prospects for rehabilitation Internally Displaced Persons say they will not feel safe until LRA leader, Joseph Kony, signs to the Juba Peace Accord. Why do they still feel so?My feeling is that they’re merely symbolising their perception of things. It’s not that particular signature that is of concern, but the LRA signature becomes a symbol of certainty which they don’t have now. I am very sure that even when that is signed, there will be another set of symbols for fear, because that fear is not going to wear down quickly. Will the signature ever materialise? No. Do IDPs acknowledge this fact? The fact that they are prepared to go home now, albeit involuntarily, tells you that they look on the other side [village homes] as the lesser risk, than remaining and getting embarrassed by the state [in camps]. So that’s the balance of things. When they project what is happening, they see little likelihood that the LRA will come back—which is a fact. Personally I have been telling that to our people; because many of the rank and file of the LRA, with whom we have interacted during the peace process, all desire to come home. And should the LRA commanders bring them anywhere near this place, I can guarantee most will just run to their villages. That’s why Kony is not coming [back]. Do you believe Operation Lightning Thunder has furthered the peace? What I was saying [shortly before the offensive] was that the peace process had reached a state of equilibrium. The LRA felt comfortable not signing, and not being attacked. Our people here felt comfortable that the LRA are not coming and they have not repudiated the negotiations. To some extent, even government felt comfortable that the LRA were far away. And at the time, I said, to break this equilibrium, something must happen. I actually talked about ‘if there was a US intervention’ because I didn’t anticipate the Ugandan government going there. As it turns out now, they went there with [American] intervention. And so that’s exactly what I’d said—you have to disorganise the equilibrium, to create opportunity for establishing a new equilibrium. Whether it goes positively towards signing the peace agreement, or it goes into the generation of the conflict and the ending of the peace process, I don’t know. It is still very confused at the moment. But at the end of the day, some kind of talking will have to take place. In this atmosphere, when will the return of IDPs to their villages end? The situation is going to remain fluid for quite some time. Basically, you are dealing with two difficult situations. One is that of young people who grew up in camps, and the camps are their homes. And then, a set of old people who knew their homes, and have had a very difficult time adapting to camp life and want to return. And this is going to be a conflict situation even within families. So, it’s likely that in quite a number of families, they may even be split, where the young kids, if they’re forced to go to the villages, will probably [instead] end up in the towns or some of the trading centres, to the extent that they would even abandon school. But one hopes that, like in my part of Acholi, in Pader district, there are people who have said they will maintain two homes. They will have one home, in the camp, to allow kids to go to school. In fact, one time, the women even told me, ‘I don’t want to go to an isolated home where my husband can beat me the way he wants! Here he can’t because he knows he will be rebuked and dealt with.’ If you go to Pader you will find that even when people move to villages, they don’t move to individual homesteads, they still aggregate in that village because of security concerns. So, I envisage a situation where villages will consist of clusters of people forming small homesteads of between 10-15 households. Single households are also being done, but not at the rate at which I see it [being done] in places like Purongo [Gulu district], where people have moved back to individual houses. So the dynamics are very fluid. But I don’t see people completely resettling back to their original homes. Delivering services like transport, health and employment may be the solution to peace. Is anybody thinking that way? I don’t think so. In fact, when you ask people who are involved [in rehabilitating IDPs], ‘what does this dispersion mean in terms of accessing these people, responding to their needs, in finding where and how they are settled?’ You will not find anything like that. Your mandate as FDC Chairman North has been renewed. Will you come up with an agenda? Absolutely. First of all, if we [FDC] came to power, the most likely thing would be that the LRA would find this a fresh opportunity to negotiate and to give up rebellion. And we hope that could happen so we now deal with the post-conflict situation, rather than conflict and how to manage it, and at the same time, to manage the challenges within. But if that didn’t happen, you know, being leaders from here, it is easier for us to respond to proposals by the communities. For example, one of the reasons why this conflict escalated was that just when Kony was at his most vulnerable, local people in Acholi wanted government to give them guns, so that they could fight the LRA. But there was so much distrust that they refused to do so; and that’s where people picked bows and arrows, and after they did that, the LRA got them, cut off their arms, saying their arms were used to [shoot arrows], that kind of thing. So with trust, it is possible to formulate a more functional response that is based on, if you like, a bottom-up approach, where the local people, who understand this conflict from their perspective more than we can possibly do, tell us what to do and then we compare this, we relate it to what must be technically done as an institution of the state. People often complain that trust is hard to attain in Uganda, owing to its history? Absolutely. So is there a silver bullet solution to get trust back on the agenda? It’s difficult. For this regime. Can any other regime do it? Oh yes! You see, trust is only broken. Once you break it, to reconstitute it is a big task. Do you think the LRA would be more amenable to talking to a different government? I would think so. By the way, in 1996, when [Paul] Ssemogerere stood [for election], I was dispatched to Nairobi and talked to the LRA at that time. And we had more or less drafted a plan of action of what would happen if Ssemogerere won; because our priority was to end that conflict immediately.  And we had agreed on quite a few things. So it is possible that people who have not betrayed or broken the trust before, can be trusted. People will always give you a blank cheque; until you cheat them. A lot of voters in 2011 are young people, who have only known camp life. Do they have the education or background to make informed choices? Right from 1996, in our campaign rallies [FDC rallies], the centre of the crowd is normally occupied by young people. And I can assure you when they listen to what we talk, they don’t listen for nothing. They pick it up, it informs their sentiments and thinking on these matters, and that is the time we build trust between us and them; and therefore we become critical leaders in their lives because they can trust us. And that’s why President Museveni has difficulties here, increasingly. If we told them, this is the way to go, this is the way to vote, they will trust us with it; and therefore, I have no doubt in my mind that they will make an informed choice. Unfortunately for President Museveni, that choice will be us. Do you think political alliances will have to be made to achieve a clear win? We are keen on sharing responsibility. We have done this in Parliament. […] But if we won, even on our own, the smartest thing to do is to bring everyone on board, including NRM cadres. We need people who can understand the security system that President Museveni has set and help us dismantle it and redirect it. Ultimately, what lasting solution does this country need? Unfortunately, what we need is regime change. As of now, without regime change, nothing useful can come out of any negotiation. Because fundamentally, President Museveni has been such a dominant force in his government that he has rendered even ministers who should technically work for him as political leaders, almost irrelevant. The institutions that should assert themselves, shy away […] So, we have hit rock bottom in terms of what we can do as an institutionalised government; and that is not sustainable. […] Of course it’s going to be very challenging. It’s almost like managing a failed state after President Museveni; because there will be no state.