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68 AFRICAN AFFAIRS to one official: ‘For ammunition, it is now 60 Kenya shillings (50 pence sterling) for one live ammunition, since they are not readily available’. 107 This is because of the distance from the source. Guns will not be sold with an empty magazine. It must have 20 or 30 bullets as part of the deal. The high price of ammunition reflects its relative scarcity in the Kenya– Uganda border area. It is interesting that disarmament has reduced the cost of arms in places because of fear of buying, whilst the cost of ammunition has gone up. Given that small arms are valueless without ammunition, it may be that a coordinated strategy to control its supply and use could be a valuable interim measure to reduce violence and insecurity, whereas the longer-term efforts to promote complete and sustained disarmament are pursued, but it is questionable why this has not yet been considered. Good governance by the governments is essential in curbing the flows from the LDUs, UPDF and KPR. Conclusion The ethnic pattern of acquisition of SALW in the cross-border areas dates from the pre-colonial era, with recurring themes of communal resource-based competition, regional instability and insurgencies, state weakness, marginalization and confrontation with the state. The repressive, corrupt or non-existent state security in rural areas has led to communities taking responsibility for their own security. Communities have used several methods to acquire arms: private purchase, attacks on government soldiers and revenge battles. In the attempt to improve security in such remote and difficult-to-manage areas, the states have resorted both to the use of paramilitary forces and to the pouring of legal weapons into the areas. While this may provide an increased sense of security in the short term, in the long term, it would be feeding localized arms races. The communities living along the Kenya–Uganda border are therefore trapped in a spiral of rising violent crime and insecurity, which is being fed by the flow of small arms into the area. Unless checked, the flow of arms from conflict areas to non-conflict areas is likely to feed this spiral of violence and insecurity and will ultimately lead to the creation of more violent communities in the Horn region. The cost of guns has drastically reduced, indicating that the region is awash with arms. Ammunition prices have however gone up, implying that more research on ammunition is necessary, as it could be the best approach to managing the small arms problems in the cross-border region in the short run. However, addressing supply without addressing demand is futile; this article has shown that guns are now an instrument of economic subsistence 107. Interview, name withheld, in Alale, 2006.
SALW AMONG PASTORAL GROUPS 69 as well as protection. The issues of weakened governance, security needs, development (livelihood) and access to land are all relevant in the perceived need for arms. At the time of writing (January 2006), 1.2 million Kenyan pastoralists were experiencing severe drought and Pokot pastoralists were moving into Uganda in search of water and pasture. 108 Historically, this has always led to tension and acquisition of arms. Although droughts have become frequent, no policy yet exists for provision of adequate land access to pastoralists within Kenya and the region. Attempts to manage small arms’ acquisition have often been insensitive to individual lives, livelihood and the ecological context, factors which are at the core of the demand for arms. Militaristic approaches such as those taken during disarmament have further ingrained the patterns of arms acquisition. The long-term hope for resolution lies in building up accountable national institutions that can meet the basic needs of their citizens. Bibliography of books and articles References to other sources, including interviews, archives, newspaper articles, websites and grey publications, are contained in relevant footnotes Anderson, David, ‘Stock theft and moral economy in colonial Kenya’, Africa 56, 4 (1986), pp. 399–416. Barber, James, Imperial Frontier (East African Publishing House, Nairobi, 1968). Gray, Sandra, ‘A memory of loss: ecological politics, local history, and the evolution of Karimojong violence’, Human Organization, 59, 4 (2000), pp. 401–18. Fleisher, Michael, ‘Cattle raiding and household demography among the Kuria of Tanzania’, Africa 69, 2 (1999) pp. 238–55. Heald, Suzette, ‘Tolerating the intolerable: cattle raiding among the Kuria’, in G. Aijmer and J. Abbink (eds), Meanings of Violence (Berg, Oxford, 2000), pp. 101–21. Hogg, Richard, ‘The new pastoralism: poverty and dependence in northern Kenya’, Africa 56, 3 (1986), pp. 319–32. Johnston, Les, ‘What is vigilantism?’ British Journal of Criminology 36, 2 (1996), pp. 220–36. Knighton, Ben, ‘The state as raider among the Karimojong: where there are no guns they use the threat of guns’, Africa 73, 203 (2003), pp. 426–55. Lefebvre, Jeffrey, Arms for the Horn: U.S. security policy in Ethiopia and Somalia 1953–1991 (University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh, 1991). Makinda, Samuel, ‘Conflict and superpower in the Horn of Africa’, Third World Quarterly 4, 1 (1982), pp. 93–103. Mirzeler, Mustafa and Crawford Young, ‘Pastoral politics in the northeast periphery in Uganda: AK47 as change agent’, Journal of Modern African Studies 38, 3 (2000), pp. 407–30. 108. See Standard Team, ‘Minister: Sh28b needed to fight famine’, Sunday Standard, 8 January 2006; See also John Korir, ‘60 billion livestock threatened’, Kenya Times, 4 January 2006 (4 January 2006).
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