‘What is Sudan's government stands towards neighbours and their intentions for the Region? What are the regime's chances of survival? I mean the Sudan regime, not any other regime.20 What are the strength and the weakness of SPLA and the Northern opposition alliance? How are they affected by changes in tactics of those who back them in the region, and globally? What is the form and extent of greater power involvement? When we talk of the greater power, we mean those who have ever launched nuclear bombs.21 And is the solution to the Sudan conflict a prerequisite for peace in Acholi Land and Northern Uganda?
At the end of the same conference the Minister of State for Northern Uganda noted participants’ concerns that the Sudan could continue as ‘the host and master of LRA and as the source of arms trafficking’ unless diplomatic relations were regularised and ‘we address issues about the role of SPLA and other rebel groups in the peace process in Northern Uganda’.22 UNICEF gave a taste of interventions to come, when in June 1998 it called for LRA abductors to be tried at the International Criminal Court,23 and a UPDF helicopter crash in July 1998 offered a further glimpse of international involvement, as the Russian-made Mi. 17, commonly known as Sura Mbaya (Swahili for ‘Ugly Face’), had been piloted by an Ethiopian.24 This prompted a statement from the LRM (Lord's Resistance Movement) that ‘We are deeply sorry for the deaths of foreign nationals being killed in an internal war between Ugandans. We appeal to the Ethiopians to stop their nationals fighting us’.25
Three important civil society groupings emerged in this period, all calling for a negotiated solution; the diaspora grouping Kacokke Madit, the Acholi Religious Leaders Peace Initiative (ARLPI), and the revived Acholi ‘traditional leaders’. With financial support from the British Government, the diaspora grouping, which described itself as ‘a non-profit making forum dedicated to identifying and implementing practical initiatives to end the armed conflict in Northern Uganda by peaceful means’, organised several big meetings (Kacokke Madit), the first two of which were held in London in 1997 and 1998 respectively. These were also attended by the Ugandan Government, Acholi Members of Parliament, religious leaders and district leaders. The third was convened in Nairobi in late 2000, but was terminated due to fears that delegates might be harbouring the Ebola virus wreaking havoc in Gulu at the time.
While the 1997 meeting was attended by LRA external coordinator, Dr James Obita, rumours put out by the New Vision that Kony would ‘lead a delegation of his supporters’26 to the 1998 one proved unfounded. One fieldworker reported that ‘Last month [June 1998] they [the LRA] were telling people that they are not going to attend “Kacokke Madit” in London since it is a waste of money. They want the “Kacokke Madit” to take place either in northern Uganda or Kampala’.27 The New Vision reported that in one preparatory meeting for Kacokke Madit 1998 Acholi exiles had ‘criticised President Yoweri Museveni for ‘not doing enough to protect and feed the people of Acholi particularly those in protected villages’”.28 A few weeks later they reported the LRA's refusal to participate, apparently because they saw it as ‘the brain child of President Museveni’.29
The formation of the Acholi Religious Leaders Peace Initiative (ARLPI) in May 1998 brought Catholics, Anglicans and Muslims from Gulu and Kitgum districts together under one umbrella. The inaugural meeting named Bedo Piny pi Kuc (‘Let us sit down for peace’), signalled a commitment to a negotiated solution and was attended by, amongst others, the Resident Representatives of the World Bank and UNDP, the Minister of State for Northern Uganda, and the UPDF's 4th Division Commander. ARLPI's membership was subsequently expanded to include religious leaders from throughout northern Uganda, and over the following years they became increasingly critical players in the anti-war camp. These processes were given extra impetus by the installation of a new Anglican bishop of Gulu, Bishop Onono Onweng in May 1998, and a new Catholic Archbishop, John Baptist Odama, in early 1999. ARLPI was to become involved in trying to make links with the LRA, raising international awareness of the situation, and confronting Government misdemeanours.
The third civil society voice to emerge in this period was the revived ‘traditional leadership’. Although widely welcomed at a local level, their restoration, far from being a purely local initiative, was in fact largely externally driven and enabled. The then Minister of State for Northern Uganda, himself an Acholi, promoted it inside Uganda with ideological support from a report written for a British NGO by a British Government Social Development Adviser. Funding came from the Belgian Government, and implementation capacity from the international NGO ACORD. The rationale was that if traditional leaders were reinstated they could do two things. Firstly, by virtue of their position they would be able to command the respect of the ‘boys in the bush’, who, it was asserted, would heed a call from the elders to lay down their weapons. Secondly, and also by virtue of their traditional roles, they would be able to effect cleansing ceremonies between returned rebels and their home communities, processes without which, it was said, reconciliation and therefore successful reintegration could not take place. Although there was no noticeable impact on levels of return from the LRA, the restoration did add another institutional voice in favour of negotiation to counter the Government's militaristic position.
There was thus increasing polarisation between the Government's preference for military solutions and civil society's favouring a negotiated one. In 1998 the Dutch chargé d'affaires reportedly said that the war in the north was affecting Uganda's image abroad and undermining its attractiveness to foreign investment. He also argued that ‘the army is draining Uganda's sons in their prime who could otherwise use their talents to build up the country’.30 Museveni remained adamant until mid-1999 that the situation demanded a ‘military solution’, ruling that negotiations with ‘bandits’ were out of the question. This was echoed by his brother, Salim Saleh, who said that ‘the conflict will be solved by military means, not dialogue’.31 When in 1997 the Report of the Committee on Defence and Internal Affairs on the War in Northern Uganda was published, it recommended pursuing the military option, obliging two Acholi members of the committee32 to append a minority report urging a negotiated solution, as they felt this more accurately reflected the wishes of those consulted.33 As such, dichotomised positions regarding a solution became an extension of the conflict itself.
Foreign governments offered some financial assistance, but generally made little (visible) strategic contribution to the debate at this stage. By 1997 the local organisation working with returned abducted children from the LRA, Gulu Support the Children Organisation (GUSCO), had established a reception centre with DANIDA funding.34 Following a visit by the all-party International Development Committee of the British House of Commons, the British Government donated items valued at 44 million Shillings to GUSCO (approx. £14,000), and these ‘included 80 mattresses, 40 double-bed-deckers, 15 sewing machines, a generator and computers’.35 Only a few weeks later
Mrs Clinton also said her country through USAID will provide U.S. $500,000 directly to local groups including Concerned Parents Association and Gulu Save the Children Organisation to help them find abducted children and give them the medical care they need to heal. She also said they will provide another U.S. $2 million over the next three years for a new Northern Uganda Initiative that will help people plagued by rebel activities get jobs, rebuild schools, health clinics and their own communities.36
There was a gradual increase in interest from international organisations, with, for example, the establishment of a UN Disaster Management Team (UNDMT) charged with developing a Relief and Rehabilitation Programme for Displaced People in northern Uganda (WFP 1999: 20). In 1997, as well as Gersony's report on the war, UNICEF set up ACRIS – the Abducted Child Registration and Information System – to record both ongoing patterns of abduction and return, and to build a retrospective picture. Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International both produced reports detailing LRA atrocities (HRW, 1997, Mawson, 1997), followed by a further one from Amnesty International on Government abuses (Mawson, 1999). In 1998 the U.K.’s television Channel 4 screened a film