Friends For Peace In Africa

Once again the national army has been deployed in a foreign country without the express authorisation of Parliament. The cause that has taken UPDF, at Christmas time into the jungles of the Democratic Republic of Congo to break the back of  rebel LRA and its leader Joseph Kony, who has for two years played mind games about signing a peace agreement, is by no small measure a justifiable action.  The army, for this, deserves support of all Ugandans.

But in its hunt for the rebels, the UPDF and its leadership should not forget that their primary constituency, the people of Uganda, can only give their support to the operation with a number of conditions and expected results within a reasonable time frame.

The national support should not translate into a blank cheque. That road has previously led us to an untenable destination when we deployed in Congo between 1997 and 2003.

The army leadership must show results and be open about its activities there. About two weeks since the operation began, the army has not allowed any independent observers especially the media  to access the bombed rebel camps in DR Congo. What the world has seen so far are pictures, taken by the army itself of soldiers occupying the camps. Other pictures show a guitar, cooking utensils and plastic jerry cans reportedly captured from the fleeing rebels.

This is not the accountability Ugandans expected from the UPDF. People expected to hear the casualty toll the army had inflicted on the enemy. There is still no word about the extent of actual damage inflicted on the reclusive rebels or an indication that the rebel leader is anywhere near being captured or that the rebels’ military strength has been crippled. There is also no independent accountability of human casualties yet the LRA has been known to replenish its ranks with vulnerable civilians mainly women and children.

The army has an obligation to demonstrate that this time round it planned better, had better intelligence. The Commander in Chief, President Museveni, has given two conflicting messages to the nation, one; he says the rebel leader is trapped but also added that Kony could have tapped the army radio communication to escape the attack on his base. The President is sending two signals here. He is chest-thumping and yet giving an excuse why the UPDF failed to rout the rebels.  

Ugandans especially in the north have lived with these kinds of high sounding declarations of how the army has surrounded Kony and his fighters only to hear a few days later that the rebels have raided villages and rained mayhem on civilians. In this Operation Lightning Thunder again we hear Kony has been surrounded. Hopefully this time he has been effectively trapped and will not escape back to brutalise civilians.

http://www.monitor.co.ug/artman/publish/opinions/Come_clear_on_the_Garamba_attack_77340.shtml