The pastoral Karamoja region of Uganda today is marked by a culture of guns, under-development, little government presence and a nearly complete lack of law and order. This report, published by Tufts University, examines the region’s pattern of guns and violence and the failure of recent attempts to disarm the Karamoja people. Governments and the international community must stop proposing solutions based on ignorance of the ecology, livelihoods and culture of the Karamoja.
The Karamoja “cluster” refers to pastoral groups living in north-eastern Uganda, north-western Kenya, south-eastern Sudan and south-western Ethiopa. Its inhabitants share the same ethnic origin and pursue cattle production; they are semi-nomadic and speak similar or related languages. The focus of this study is north-eastern Uganda; its population is just under one million.
Armed violence in colonial Karamoja was caused by raids by neighbours and private armies hired by competing ivory traders. Territorial restrictions imposed by British occupiers caused people to continue to arm to protect land and livelihoods. Post-colonial Ugandan disarmament policies have had little effect; the region suffers from erosion of tribal mores and weapons proliferation.
The large number of guns and increasing violence in the Karamoja today is caused by the following factors:
- Weapons supplies include guns abandoned by Sudanese Civil War combatants and alleged weapons sales by Ugandan military commanders. They also include supplies from the Democratic Republic of Congo, private weapons peddlers and gun markets.
- Ugandan political parties manipulate pastoralists by allowing them to own guns to help repel insurgencies and rewarding them by giving them more guns.
- In the past, one family owned one gun controlled by elders. Due to increased availability, guns are now owned by young people. Once controlled by elaborate tribal rituals of notice, raids today are sudden, increasingly violent and often undertaken for commercial reasons.
- Recent demobilisation, disarmament and reintegration have been marred by lack of consultation with the people, uneven implementation and failure to protect communities that have disarmed. In 2006, voluntary disarmament was replaced by forced disarmament by government military operations that included murder, torture and destruction of communities.
- The people feel that government fails to understand their need to own guns to protect not only their livelihoods, but also their cultural norms and mores.
Both governments and the international community need to recognise the importance of historic and tribal factors in the current environment of guns and violence in the Karamoja. The following recommendations are a mere beginning of the process to end violence:
- The Ugandan Government should discuss the region’s problems with traditional representatives of the Karamoja culture: elders, local politicians and women.
- The Government must recognise Karamoja as a priority region.
- Attempts to control arms must include regional and neighbouring states.
- Programmes, including those addressing water and dam issues, are needed in order to improve pastoral livelihoods and create other economic opportunities.
