UGANDA

NATIONAL CONFLICTS
Uganda as British administered territory. 71 This event was identified by participants as
a conflict in itself, as well as the source of many ongoing conflicts on the continent. 72 In
the so-called ‘Scramble for Africa’ artificially drawn boundaries split ethnic groups into
separate territories and created new political entities composed of diverse populations.
While these boundaries were delineated according to colonial interests in resource
extraction, and sparked both inter- and intra-state conflicts, they have endured and
continue to define the shape of modern African countries. 73 In Uganda’s case, this has
affected relationships with the Democratic Republic of the Congo, South Sudan, Kenya,
Tanzania and Rwanda. The Berlin Conference furthermore set a precedent for the use
of divide-and-rule strategies, such as the modern-day division of citizens into districts
under the guise of decentralisation.
2. Conflict between Traditional and New/Western Religions (1880s -
present)
The arrival of European explorers was followed by the arrival of Christian missionaries
in the 1870s. When Anglican Protestants and Roman Catholics first arrived in the
Buganda Kingdom they found that prior engagements with Arab traders had inspired
a number of Baganda to embrace Islam. The arrival of different religions in a short
time-span led to “a deeply confusing situation which was not helped by [Buganda King]
Mutesa’s reluctance to choose between four competing faiths (Buganda’s indigenous
pantheon of Gods, two rival versions of Christianity, and Islam)”. 74 The subsequent
Buganda King, Kabaka Mwanga, conflicted with both Christians 75 and Muslims at
different times. A number of religious wars between Muslims and Christians and
Protestants and Catholics broke out. 76 Western religious institutions, represented first
by Catholic and Anglican missionaries, and later by right-wing Pentecostal evangelists,
have consistently condemned and interfered with indigenous African beliefs. As a
result, they have promoted extensive divisions between Ugandans who shifted to the
new religious institutions and those who instead remained dedicated to existing belief
systems. Before the introduction of the “new” religions, participants asserted that there
had been a consensus on acceptable religious practices based on customary beliefs. 77
According to some participants, Pentecostal churches, among others, continue to
71 In 1984, this territory covered the current Uganda, excluding West Nile and Karamoja. West Nile was
brought under British administration in 1914 and Karamoja in 1922. See Leopold, M. (2006) Legacies
of slavery in North-West Uganda: The story of the ‘one-elevens’. Journal of the International African
Institute, 76 (2), pp. 180- 199
72 Research conducted in Arua District
73 Griffiths, I. (1986) The scramble for Africa: Inherited political boundaries. The Geographical Journal, 152
(2) p. 204
74 Low, D.A. (2009) Fabrication of empire: The British and the Uganda kingdoms 1890-1902. Cambridge,
Cambridge University Press, p. 3
75 One of the most violent episodes in Kabaka Mwanga’s interaction with converted Baganda Christians was
his mass execution of the “Uganda Martyrs” in 1886 at Namugongo. The Christians were executed for
their resistance to the Kabaka’s authority, in particular his sexual advances. Their death is commemorated
up to today on June 3rd each year, a national holiday. Some two decades earlier, a number of Muslims had
also met their death under similar circumstances, ordered by the Kabaka
76 The information in this paragraph is drawn from Low, D.A. (2009), Fabrication of empire: The British and
the Uganda kingdoms 1890-1902. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, and is provided as background
to what participants described as the conflict between traditional and new/Western religions.
77 Research conducted in Kasese District
65