UGANDA

EASTERN CONFLICTS
militia received support from local leaders and ultimately also from the Government.
Participants acknowledged the contribution of the Arrow Boys toward driving the LRA
out of Soroti, though they also expressed concerns that the LRA rebellion has not yet
ended. Furthermore, the participants indicated that the animosity between the Acholi
and Iteso resulting from the LRA incursion in Teso, would need to be addressed.
One female participant in Tubur sub-county, Soroti District stated;
“We hear that LRA are no longer in Uganda but for some of
us whose children were either killed or kidnapped and their
whereabouts are not known feel that the LRA are around,
if they are not around, then where are my children they abducted
when I was seeing?” She further said that “The Arrow
Boys and UPDF fought fierce battles with LRA, defeated
them and drove them out of Teso land and Uganda, but we
the women are fighting psychological wars of painful endless
thoughts, worries and imagination over our children
kidnapped by LRA, and this is going to finish us because
there is nothing we can do about it.” 408
POST-ARMED CONFLICT & DISPLACEMENT CONFLICTS IN
THE EASTERN REGION
As in northern Uganda, the east suffered from land conflicts related to prior
conflict-induced mass displacement of people.
87. Post-Displacement land conflicts in the eastern region (2005 - present)
Participants from Teso revealed that the displacement of the region’s population to
Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camps during the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) conflict
later resulted in significant disputes over the ownership of abandoned land. When the
formerly displaced people finally returned to their villages, many found their land had
come to be occupied by their neighbours. This caused frustration, anger and violence as
well as biting poverty given the absence of appropriate mechanisms to amicably settle
disputes. As a result, many poor people have resorted to poisoning and witchcraft to
settle differences with one another, since both formal and traditional justice mechanisms
have loopholes. 409 Other land conflicts include disputes between Iteso and neighbouring
ethnic communities (Karimojong, Kumam, Acholi Labwor/Etur), as well as conflicts
between Iteso and the Government over 38,000 hectares of land that was given by the
community to the Government in 1960s. 410
408 Research conducted in Soroti District
409 Ibid
410 Based on validation workshop discussions on September 18, 2012
183