UPDF intensify search for Joseph Kony

           

The UPDF has so far not located the Lord’s Resistence Army (LRA) leader Joseph Kony's hideout.

 

Kony has changed tactics. He has stopped killing and abducting people in Central Africa Republic (CAR). It has therefore become difficult for the UPDF squads hunting for him to track him, according to the Commander of Operation Lightening Thunder, Colonel Joseph Balikuddembe has said. 

 

 Kony and his LRA rebels fled the onslaught against their bases in Garamba Forest in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to Central African in 2008 when the UPDF launched Operation Lightening thunder.  Some scattered deeper into the DRC where they are still abducting people since the UPDF pulled out of the country last year.

 

Operation Lightening Thunder is still vigorously pursuing Kony in the sprawling jungles of CAR but has been confronted with unexpected twists.   

 

“The problem with   locating and fighting Kony in the CAR is that he has changed tactics. He no longer fights. He no longer abducts people. The rebels have stopped wearing dreadlocks and they no longer have gardens. '' Balikuddembe said at a media briefing at Djema which is the last logistical base and the heart of the operation against the LRA in CAR. 

 

Journalists were later dropped in various locations in wild where they joined the relentless hunt for the elusive rebel leader. 

 

 "Kony decided not to raid civilians because he was losing his fighters.  Kony and his people now survive on wild yams while others have taken to fishing for survival.  We got that intelligence from those we captured, ‘‘the soft spoken Balikuddembe explained and gave other factors that have made the operation drag on for long.

 

 According to Balikuddembe and other commanders on the ground whom the New Vision interacted with, the presence of other nomadic groups in the operation area has also complicated the operation.

 

The vast jungles of CAR are home to nomadic tribes like the Ambororo , the Janjaweed from the Sudan and other cattle keeping nomads from Cameroon and Nigeria.  " Sometimes we pick a trail and follow knowing they could be rebels  only to land on the herdsmen .''

 

 The Nomadic tribes, apart from the Janjaweed who are of Arab origin (they once attacked the UPDF) are not allied to any party and sometimes give false intelligence to keep the UPDF a distance from their grazing area.  They do the same to Kony rebels.

 

  According to Captain Stephen Kiiza who commands two hunting squads and with whom this writer moved for two days, the Ambororo once gave them false information that led them to a wild goose chase for two days.

 

  "The Ambororo told us they had seen the rebels about 30 km away.  We moved for two days and found nothing. They wanted us away from their area. They also do it to the rebels. They don't want a fight near them,’’ says Kiiza.

 

The UPDF operates in a very sparsely populated vast area stretching from the CAR DRC border to near Darfur in Sudan.  

 

According to military intelligence, the locals are also mere spectators who have not taken an interest in the operation apart from knowing that the Uganda army is chasing a dangerous enemy.    The CAR government has less control about what is happening.

 

 The Operation's main logistical base is at Nzara in Southern Sudan.  Djema  is about 365km North West of Nzara with Obo another logistical base in  roughly in between the two. 

 

 Helicopters and fixed winged planes are used to transport troops and deliver supplies to battle hardened hunting squads scattered all over the jungles of CAR.  Not less than 26 hunting squads are hunting for Kony day and night.  Because the area is dry, the hunt for rebels is concentrated along all major rivers like Vovodo and crocodile infested Chinko.  As Colonel Balikudembe was briefing journalists, a crocodile killed one UPDF solder as they crossed River Chinko.