small arms and light weapons among pastoral groups in the kenya ...

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48 AFRICAN AFFAIRS border, estimates of the number of arms in circulation range from 40,000, for a population of 950,000 men, women and children, 2 to 80,000, or even 200,000 in some media estimates. 3 To put it in another way, interviews with the community noted ‘Out of a family of ten, which is quite typical in pastoral areas on the border, three are often men and each is in ownership of a small arm, with boys as young as fourteen years of age’. 4 In Kenya, there are possibly 50,000 guns in civilian hands. 5 The region is ethnically diverse. On the Kenyan side, the 933-km boundary traverses the homelands of the Samia, Teso, Pokot, Sabaot and Turkana, dividing these groups from the Ugandan Karimojong (comprising Matheniko, Bokora and Pian) and also the Upe (Ugandan Pokot), Dodoth, Jie and mountain groups. 6 At its northernmost point, the border adjoins Sudan. Most communities are largely nomadic and pastoral, with cattle herding providing the main economy in this very arid region. Cattle rustling is a traditional activity among all plains pastoralists. Historically, it has been a method of wealth redistribution to ensure that all were fed at times of scarcity and also a means of payment for bride price and the making of alliances with other groups. For centuries, spears, bows and arrows were used in raids, deaths were treated seriously and compensated with cattle, and warriors rarely harmed women, children or the elderly. However, the last 25 years have seen a transformation of raiding into large-scale armed conflict, resulting in many deaths and the emergence of racketeers and bandits. 7 Recent conflicts in the cross-border area have been characterized by a number of worrying developments. First, there have been an 2. Mustafa Mirzeler 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; Action for Development of Local Communities (ADOL), ‘The Karimojong response to disarmament: six months later’, (Unpublished report, ADOL/Pax Christi, Netherlands and Kampala, 2002); Kennedy Mkutu, ‘Pastoralist Conflict and Small Arms: The Kenya–Uganda border region’ (Consultancy for Saferworld, London, 2003). 3. Interview with former resident district commissioner in Kotido, 2 February 2003. 4. Interviews with victims of small arms injuries including a 15-year-old victim in Kanwata, Karamoja, 2001–4. 5. How the figure is arrived at is unclear: see ‘Disarm them’ East African Standard (30 August 2005). 6. Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBO), ‘National Population and Housing Census’, (Government report, Kampala, 2003). 7. For details, see David Anderson, ‘Stock theft and moral economy in colonial Kenya’, Africa 56, 4 (1986), pp. 399–416; Richard Hogg ‘The new pastoralism: poverty and dependence in northern Kenya’, Africa 56, 3 (1986), pp. 319–32; Kennedy Mkutu, Pastoral Conflict, Governance and Small Arms in the North Rift, Northeast Africa (University of Bradford, Unpublished PhD thesis, 2005); Kennedy Mkutu, ‘Pastoralist Conflict in the Horn of Africa’ [Consultancy for African Peace Forum (APFO)/Saferworld/University of Bradford, 2001]; Derrick Belshaw and Joshua Malinga, ‘The Kalashnikov economies of the Eastern Sahel: cumulative or cyclical differentiation between nomadic pastoralists’ (Unpublished report, Development Studies Association, South Bank University of East Anglia, 1999); Suzette Heald, ‘Tolerating the intolerable: cattle raiding among the Kuria’ in G. Aijmer and J. Abbink (eds), Meanings of Violence: A cross-cultural perspective (Berg, Oxford, 2000), pp. 101–21. Bruno Novelli, ‘Karimojong Traditional Religion’ (Comboni Missionaries, Kampala, 1999); Augusto Pazzaglia, The Karimojong: Some aspects (Camboni Missionaries, Bologna, 1982).
SALW AMONG PASTORAL GROUPS 49 increased number of attacks on unarmed civilians, in particular women, elderly people and children. 8 Second, there has been a growth in the number of raiders and in the sophistication of the arms that they carry. The raiders often come in armies of 100–500 people, sometimes even thousands, thereby outnumbering the security forces. 9 The area is awash with SALW 10 which are not the cause of these conflicts but which exacerbate interethnic tensions, intensify violence and contribute both to the impoverishment of the regions and to wider destabilization, as arms are dispersed to other peaceful parts of Kenya and Uganda. 11 In the recent past, political instability related to cattle raiding has been experienced in the northern regions of Uganda and Kenya and the countries to their north, on a massive, even devastating scale. 12 Even in the more politically stable regions, raiding appears more virulent because of its integration into the market economy and the influx of SALW. 13 This strengthening of the predatory wing of the pastoral economy has posed obvious threats to both the subsistence base and the security of local communities. Agencies of the state (police and courts) as well as traditional redressive procedures under the control of elders have proved ineffective in halting the depredations of the raiders. 14 Sislin et al. note that ‘systematic, rigorous analyses of the arms acquiring patterns of disputing ethnic groups are lacking. Mostly, this is the product of the shortage of reliable data’. 15 Such information is vital for security and development interventions and in turn for poverty eradication. This article aims to contribute evidence on the transformation brought by arms to pastoral societies by answering three questions. First, who are the actors involved in the small arms dynamics, and why the demand for arms? Second, what are the patterns of accumulation and flows of arms to pastoralists? 8. Kennedy Mkutu, ‘Armed Pastoralist Conflicts and Peace Building in Karamoja: The Role of Gender’ [Consultancy for Netherlands Development Agency (SNV), Kampala, 2005]. 9. Interviews in Karamoja, various sources, 2001–4. 10. ‘50,000 guns in wrong hands, says Michuki’ Daily Nation (29 August 2005). 11. Belshaw and Malinga ‘The Kalashnikov economies’. 12. Mkutu, Pastoralist Conflict, Governance and Small Arms; Anderson, ‘Stock theft’; Natalie Gomez and Kennedy Mkutu, ‘Breaking the Cycle of Violence: Building capacity for development in Karamoja, Uganda’ (Consultancy for SNV/Pax Christi, Kampala, 2004); Mkutu, Armed Pastoralist Conflict . . . the Role of Gender; Ton Dietz, Pastoralists in dire straits: survival strategies and external interventions in a semi arid region at the Kenya/Uganda border: Western Pokot, 1900–1986 (Instituut Voor Sociale Geografie, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, Unpublished PhD Thesis, 1987); National Council of Churches of Kenya/SNV/Semi-arid Rural Development Project (SARDEP) ‘Pacifying the valley: an analysis of the Kerio valley conflict’, (Report NCCK/SNV/SARDEP, Nairobi, 2001). 13. Heald, ‘Tolerating the intolerable’; Michael Fleisher, ‘Cattle raiding and household demography among the Kuria of Tanzania’ Africa 69, 2 (1999), pp. 238–55. 14. Mkutu, Pastoralist Conflict, Governance and Small Arms. 15. John Sislin, John Pearson, Jocelyn Boryczka, and Jeffrey Weigand, ‘Patterns in arms acquisitions by ethnic groups in conflict’, Security Dialogue, 29, 4 (1998), pp. 393–408.
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