After 22 Years, Still Waiting for Godot in Northern Uganda
ESTRAGON: Where shall we go?
VLADIMIR: I don't Know.
Silence.
ESTRAGON: Oh yes, let's go far away from here.
VLADIMIR: We can't.
ESTRAGON: Why not?
VLADIMIR: We have to come back tomorrow.
ESTRAGON: What for?
VLADIMIR: To wait for Godot.
ESTRAGON: Ah! (Silence.)He didn't come?
VLADIMIR: No.
ESTRAGON: And now it's too late.
VLADIMIR: Yes, now it's night.
Samuel Beckett. Waiting for Godot. Faber and Faber, 1965 (1956); Act II, p.92
News that the Juba Peace Talks on northern Uganda has collpsed, is a mixed bag of good and bad. The bad news is that, this prolongs the suffering of the people of northern Uganda, many of whom had already broken through the paddocks of concentration camps to return to their ancestral lands. Moreover, the collapse of the talks, if true, plays into the hands of war-mongers and those who have been able to exploit the war economy, who will try to alarm and frighten the population back into camps to serve their own selfish interests. While a return to open conflict may not be possible, if both parties remain committed to a permanent ceasefire; and knowing that the LRA insurgents are West of the Nile in the jungles of Congo and far from the borders of northern Uganda, still a complete collapse that leaves a vaccuum, palpable uncertainty, fluid security situation and mutual suspicion, is like tinder doused with petrol, that friction from even a falling twig would set alight. So tha bad news still is that, our people's lives are put on hold, as we all wait and wait for Godot, unable to ascertain who he is and whether he has already walked by and gone. But the waiting game goes on.
On the other hand, a complete collapse of the talks gives a needed pause and necessary self-examination and reflection by all the elements involved in the peace process. From the International observer team to the mediation secretariat in Juba, principal parties, civil society representatives from the war affected areas, onlookers in the diaspora and political leaders from Acholiland, must all step back and re-evaluate their positions, appraise their steps, and honestly come to terms with what, indeed went wrong, and what could have been done to salvage the process.
I for one, am not surprised by the outcome of the talks so far. I have pointed here and elsewhere that, it was a flawed process, in design, expectations, participation, focus, and management. While I am no pessimist, I had no dobuts that not a lot of faith needed to be invested in the Juba process to deliver a fair, just, equitable, and sustainable outcome and the peace Acholi and northern Uganda have been waiting for for the last 22 years.
Part of my pessimism lay in the partial investigation and indictments of the LRM / A leaders by the ICC, as if the LRA were fighting among themselves without another protagonist. Despite myriad stories and evidence of atrocities on both sides of the belligerents, the ICC chose to close its eyes and ears, and go after only one party in the conflict, the LRA, and the weaker of the two. Although they were right to indict leaders of the LRA, they were certainly wrong to believe that government forces were the good guys in nortthern Uganda. Initially, they could be given the benefit of the doubt, that there were well more overwhelming collated evidence against the LRA readily available than any on the government forces. But three years on, and all we have heard is ICC digging itself deeper and deeper in its partial approach to justice in northern Uganda. In the end, reasonable and fairminded people begin to wonder why no investigations in other directions are forthcoming from the ICC. Therefore, due process did not seem to be something the search for justice in northern Uganda required. Really?
The other area is the disorganisation and lack of thinking on the part of political and civil society leaders from the war affected areas, particularly Acholi. With the exception of their 1996 founding of Kacoke Madit (KM) and its pioneering partnerships with Acholi Religious Leaders'Peace Initiatives (ARLPI) and Acholi Traditional Leaders, the Acholi Parliamentary Group (APG), and other civil society peace groups, the Acholi elite at home and in the diaspora, have for the past 11 years, beeen sitting on their hands. Undoubtedly, there have been advocacy and lobbying by one or the other marginal group or individuals, but nothing extraordinary and transformational and challenging to the status quo, as did their founding of KM and building Acholi consensus for peace and resolve to stand up and fight on behalf of those brutalised by the war. In the end, lack of trust and mutaul suspicion drove many out of KM, and the lure of donor project money and being one's own boss, caused the noble, collaborative partnerships to collapse, when entities like the ARLPI, Traditional Leaders, and others put organisational autonomy and owning, controling and directing the process and taking sole credit over and above collaborative and consultative network for information sharing and decision making. Consequently, those who feared a unified and collaborative Acholi position on the war and the goals for peace, cultivated autonomies of decision and action, which led to the collapse of the Diaspora-in-country collaboration and a weakening of Acholi voice in the peace process.
given these past experiences, the collapse of the Juba Peace process, though regretable, should also be seen as a fresh opportunity for Acholi political, Traditional, Religious and civil society to rectify their mistakes. Instead of standing on the sidelines while two belligerents discuss our fate and our future, it is time for Acholi political and civic leadership, and the intelligentsia inside and outside Acholi, to cobble together a representative group of people to begin thrashing out realistic positions on the ICC, the peace we want and post conflict re-integeration of Acholi into the national life of Uganda and post-conflict reconstruction issues.
On the ICC issue, I still maintain that, it was a gross mistake for Acholi to oppose it. Acholi should have embraced the ICC indictments but express reservations on its partiality and inadequacy in addressing justice questions of a 22 year war, with the ICC mandate going back only six years from 2008. They must insist on a full, independent investigations of all parties since 1986 for war crimes and crimes against humanity by a UN special tribunal. Therefore, our efforts should have been better spent lobbying for an international special tribunal. Furthermore, Acholi must have an independent delegation sitting at the negotiating table in a tripartite process involving the LRM/A, the NRM /A and Acholi Civil Society, in order to ensure that we get the peace we want. Moreover, we need to realise that Mato Oput is a nosensical distraction that must be thrown overboard if we want to be taken seriously.
At this point, we should have realised that we have waited and waited for Godot for far too long, without any clarity on who he is and when he is coming. It is time for us to do something for ourselves, rather than keep on waiting for Godot, to reveal himself and rescue us. Or we shall ask:
VLADIMIR: Was I sleeping, while the others suffered? Am I sleeping now? Tomorrow, when I wake, or think I do, what shall I say of today? That with Estragon my friend, at this place, until the fall of night, I waited for Godot? That Pozzo passed, with his carrier, and that he spoke to us? Probably. But in all that what truth will there be?
Samuel Beckett. Waiting for Godot. Act II, p.90
VLADIMIR: I don't Know.
Silence.
ESTRAGON: Oh yes, let's go far away from here.
VLADIMIR: We can't.
ESTRAGON: Why not?
VLADIMIR: We have to come back tomorrow.
ESTRAGON: What for?
VLADIMIR: To wait for Godot.
ESTRAGON: Ah! (Silence.)He didn't come?
VLADIMIR: No.
ESTRAGON: And now it's too late.
VLADIMIR: Yes, now it's night.
Samuel Beckett. Waiting for Godot. Faber and Faber, 1965 (1956); Act II, p.92
News that the Juba Peace Talks on northern Uganda has collpsed, is a mixed bag of good and bad. The bad news is that, this prolongs the suffering of the people of northern Uganda, many of whom had already broken through the paddocks of concentration camps to return to their ancestral lands. Moreover, the collapse of the talks, if true, plays into the hands of war-mongers and those who have been able to exploit the war economy, who will try to alarm and frighten the population back into camps to serve their own selfish interests. While a return to open conflict may not be possible, if both parties remain committed to a permanent ceasefire; and knowing that the LRA insurgents are West of the Nile in the jungles of Congo and far from the borders of northern Uganda, still a complete collapse that leaves a vaccuum, palpable uncertainty, fluid security situation and mutual suspicion, is like tinder doused with petrol, that friction from even a falling twig would set alight. So tha bad news still is that, our people's lives are put on hold, as we all wait and wait for Godot, unable to ascertain who he is and whether he has already walked by and gone. But the waiting game goes on.
On the other hand, a complete collapse of the talks gives a needed pause and necessary self-examination and reflection by all the elements involved in the peace process. From the International observer team to the mediation secretariat in Juba, principal parties, civil society representatives from the war affected areas, onlookers in the diaspora and political leaders from Acholiland, must all step back and re-evaluate their positions, appraise their steps, and honestly come to terms with what, indeed went wrong, and what could have been done to salvage the process.
I for one, am not surprised by the outcome of the talks so far. I have pointed here and elsewhere that, it was a flawed process, in design, expectations, participation, focus, and management. While I am no pessimist, I had no dobuts that not a lot of faith needed to be invested in the Juba process to deliver a fair, just, equitable, and sustainable outcome and the peace Acholi and northern Uganda have been waiting for for the last 22 years.
Part of my pessimism lay in the partial investigation and indictments of the LRM / A leaders by the ICC, as if the LRA were fighting among themselves without another protagonist. Despite myriad stories and evidence of atrocities on both sides of the belligerents, the ICC chose to close its eyes and ears, and go after only one party in the conflict, the LRA, and the weaker of the two. Although they were right to indict leaders of the LRA, they were certainly wrong to believe that government forces were the good guys in nortthern Uganda. Initially, they could be given the benefit of the doubt, that there were well more overwhelming collated evidence against the LRA readily available than any on the government forces. But three years on, and all we have heard is ICC digging itself deeper and deeper in its partial approach to justice in northern Uganda. In the end, reasonable and fairminded people begin to wonder why no investigations in other directions are forthcoming from the ICC. Therefore, due process did not seem to be something the search for justice in northern Uganda required. Really?
The other area is the disorganisation and lack of thinking on the part of political and civil society leaders from the war affected areas, particularly Acholi. With the exception of their 1996 founding of Kacoke Madit (KM) and its pioneering partnerships with Acholi Religious Leaders'Peace Initiatives (ARLPI) and Acholi Traditional Leaders, the Acholi Parliamentary Group (APG), and other civil society peace groups, the Acholi elite at home and in the diaspora, have for the past 11 years, beeen sitting on their hands. Undoubtedly, there have been advocacy and lobbying by one or the other marginal group or individuals, but nothing extraordinary and transformational and challenging to the status quo, as did their founding of KM and building Acholi consensus for peace and resolve to stand up and fight on behalf of those brutalised by the war. In the end, lack of trust and mutaul suspicion drove many out of KM, and the lure of donor project money and being one's own boss, caused the noble, collaborative partnerships to collapse, when entities like the ARLPI, Traditional Leaders, and others put organisational autonomy and owning, controling and directing the process and taking sole credit over and above collaborative and consultative network for information sharing and decision making. Consequently, those who feared a unified and collaborative Acholi position on the war and the goals for peace, cultivated autonomies of decision and action, which led to the collapse of the Diaspora-in-country collaboration and a weakening of Acholi voice in the peace process.
given these past experiences, the collapse of the Juba Peace process, though regretable, should also be seen as a fresh opportunity for Acholi political, Traditional, Religious and civil society to rectify their mistakes. Instead of standing on the sidelines while two belligerents discuss our fate and our future, it is time for Acholi political and civic leadership, and the intelligentsia inside and outside Acholi, to cobble together a representative group of people to begin thrashing out realistic positions on the ICC, the peace we want and post conflict re-integeration of Acholi into the national life of Uganda and post-conflict reconstruction issues.
On the ICC issue, I still maintain that, it was a gross mistake for Acholi to oppose it. Acholi should have embraced the ICC indictments but express reservations on its partiality and inadequacy in addressing justice questions of a 22 year war, with the ICC mandate going back only six years from 2008. They must insist on a full, independent investigations of all parties since 1986 for war crimes and crimes against humanity by a UN special tribunal. Therefore, our efforts should have been better spent lobbying for an international special tribunal. Furthermore, Acholi must have an independent delegation sitting at the negotiating table in a tripartite process involving the LRM/A, the NRM /A and Acholi Civil Society, in order to ensure that we get the peace we want. Moreover, we need to realise that Mato Oput is a nosensical distraction that must be thrown overboard if we want to be taken seriously.
At this point, we should have realised that we have waited and waited for Godot for far too long, without any clarity on who he is and when he is coming. It is time for us to do something for ourselves, rather than keep on waiting for Godot, to reveal himself and rescue us. Or we shall ask:
VLADIMIR: Was I sleeping, while the others suffered? Am I sleeping now? Tomorrow, when I wake, or think I do, what shall I say of today? That with Estragon my friend, at this place, until the fall of night, I waited for Godot? That Pozzo passed, with his carrier, and that he spoke to us? Probably. But in all that what truth will there be?
Samuel Beckett. Waiting for Godot. Act II, p.90
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