'Another way of seeing' in Uganda
The Acholi tribe in northern Uganda faces a huge question now that the region is inching closer to the end of two decades of conflict: What should happen to the rebel Lord's Resistance Army and its Acholi leaders, who have been responsible for the abduction of thousands of children, forced to commit atrocities against their own commmunities and each other.
British novellist Monica Ali traveled to the area with Oxfam to ask this very question. She interviewed people who had been forced to abandon their homes and crops and seek safety in overcrowded camps.
Writing in Britain's Observer newspaper, Ali says: "Surely the Acholis need justice" after the brutality and terror they have experienced at the hands of the rebels.
But as she speaks to groups of widows, students and impromptu gatherings in the camps, the answer is always the same: The International Criminal Court should withdraw and the Acholi tribe should be given time to resolve the conflict and reconcile with the rebels in their own way.
This means going through the traditional Matu Put system of reconciliation, which involves slaughtering a sheep, drinking symbolic potions and casting omens.
But even if this is enough to bring about reconciliation with the rebel soldiers, Ali asks how the community can forgive the man behind the rebel movement, LRA leader Joseph Kony. Would the Matu Put system be a question of peace at any price?
One elderly man in the group, Ocira Luka, tries to explain: "If you give birth to twins, they may not weigh the same. And one twin may be good and one may be bad. Kony is like the bad twin. Still, he belongs to you. Kony should be talked to by the elders so they bring him into line and then he will be accepted back."
Monica Ali writes later: "I think about justice and what it means. I think about our [British] prisons, bursting at the seams, the lip service we pay to rehabilitation.
"I think about my expectations for this trip, how I expected to be moved by suffering, when what has moved me most has been this; another way of seeing."
Any views expressed in this article are those of the author and not of Reuters.
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