THE disarmament of Karimojong warriors (Karachuna) recently resulted in the death of UPDF’s Maj. Kham Rwashande and his team. Later, a UPDF helicopter killed several people and cattle after it was attacked by warriors on Saturday. The UPDF Chief of Defence Forces, Gen. Aronda Nyakairima, talked to Alfred Wasike about the exercise.

QUESTION: How is the disarmament exercise progressing?
ANSWER: We are doing very well. There is no way out of this one. All the illegal guns must be taken away. We no longer accept such excuses as: we are keeping guns for cultural reasons or to protect ourselves. We have listened to arguments from some people in Karamoja that God created them to have guns. What are they talking about? Guns came later and for violence reasons.

Government will recover all the weapons whether the Karimojong like it or not. At first we started with the mental disarmament to sensitise and mobilise them towards voluntary surrender of weapons but they did not want to cooperate.

What about the ones you recover from voluntary owners?
We have received only two guns from voluntary surrender while forcefully we have recovered 200. We are facing up to Karamoja. That area has lagged behind in development because of the lawlessness there. We cannot tolerate this.

May be these people are actually insecure?
If their excuse is that they need guns to protect themselves then what will the people of Bundibugyo, Kasese and Kabarole ask for since the ADF are armed in bases very near our border with the DRC. We know for sure that there are bases at Elenget which is 70 km from the DRC/Uganda border, Malika which is 20 km away and Bunduguya which is 40 km away.

Why don’t the people in western Uganda demand for guns to protect themselves? The government of the DRC in Kinshasa and the UN MONUC office in that area know about these armed terrorists. We have repeatedly requested that they do something, like even move them 100 miles away from the border if they cannot disband their camps, but they have not done anything yet.

What about a force that local leaders are pushing for?
A group of ministers and MPs is pushing to create a force of 8,000 with their own guns and command structure to help pick illegal weapons. There are 35,000-40,000 illegal guns in Karamoja. Arrow and Amuka were raised, trained, armed and paid by the UPDF. How do we know that the force that those leaders are pushing for will not cross into Teso, Acholi, Lango and other areas? The bottom-line is that the guns must go.

What is the death toll from the recent clashes?
There is an on-going cordon, search and disarm operation. Recently, a clash between the armed warriors and the UPDF that was conducting this operation resulted in the death a commanding officer in Kotido. On the same day there was another operation in Kaabong. It also resulted into a clash between the UPDF and the Karimojong warriors.

The operation is in pursuit of those individuals who despite the sensitisation and mobilisation of the communities in Karamoja are doing what they are not supposed to do. We told them not to ambush vehicles on public roads because if they do that they paralyse public transport which means that Government and NGOs cannot deliver services to their communities.

The other day examination papers had to be flown by the UPDF to the exam centres. We warned them against leaving Karamoja and crossing to the neighbouring regions with their guns. We told them that you can take your cattle for watering but for God’s sake don’t carry your weapons. They have defied that because last dry season they crossed into Acholi and Lango carrying their guns before the ink of the resolution could dry, that is, in spite of our agreement with them.

We shall pursue them and recover all the illegal weapons. We also warned them not to go from one ethnic area, for example from Bokora to Jie to Matheniko to rustle cattle, and not to take the guns to public places like markets, prayer venues, etc. Recently when President Museveni interacted with them, they criticised our cordon, search and disarm operation. Then President Museveni decided that all guns in Karamoja must be recovered. The plan to recover all the guns is about to be completed. We are combing manyatta to manyatta and house to house.

What is their reaction?
They are now behaving like Kony’s terrorists. They are using their difficult terrain to hide the cattle they have raided. Kony used to use difficult terrain like Imatong hills, Kit valley, Kilak hills. Now these warriors rustle cattle and withdraw to Kadama, Morungole mountains and other such inaccessible places. They commit the crime, the violence, and then withdraw into hiding.

What have you done about that?
We have decided to support our cordon, search and disarm operation on the ground with aerial surveillance. Using reconnaissance aircraft we are able to pin-point their hiding places. We are also using reconnaissance helicopters to re-enforce our ground troops.

What about the death toll?
But we have instituted a board of inquiry into the killing of our commander and others in Kotido. Was it a mistake on behalf of the commanding officer? Did he have what was required to conduct the cordon, search and disarm operation? All these questions are being investigated and the answers will be made public. Our aircraft that was on routine patrol was shot at. We returned fire.

What about Prime Minister Apolo Nsibambi’s plans for Karamoja and the rest of northern Uganda?
We are aware that the Office of the Prime Minister has a parallel programme for kicking off development projects in Karamoja. But it will not hold us back. Only forceful disarmament will secure the lawless area for the development projects.

What about human rights abuses by the UPDF during disarmament?
There have been very many falsehoods on human rights abuses by the army. Our stand on discipline is as of old. The UPDF has one standard of discipline in Kapchorwa, Kisoro and elsewhere around the country. Our position is to respect wananchi because we work for them. Uganda’s Constitutions obliges us to do that. We are disarming to eradicate lawlessness so that Karamoja can develop like other parts of Uganda. We are very strict with discipline.

When we arrest black sheep in our midst we take immediate and stern action. You remember the case where our soldiers killed an Irish priest (Fr. Duclan O’Toole) and his people in Karamoja? We tried the soldiers and when we found them guilty, we executed them. No one should use isolated incidents to condemn the UPDF.