Massacre exposes failures in war on Uganda rebels
By Paul Busharizi
KAMPALA (Reuters) - A new massacre in Uganda carried out by rebels led by a self-proclaimed mystic has sparked public anger that the government could not prevent it, but there are few signs of a new strategy to defeat the 17-year insurgency.
The Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) committed one of its worst mass killings last week, slaughtering more than 200 civilians sheltering in a camp set up in northern Uganda to protect them from just such an attack.
Outrage at the army's failure to stop the bloodshed boiled over into a day of violence in the nearby town of Lira on Wednesday. At least four people were beaten to death by crowds who accused them of sympathizing with the rebels.
President Yoweri Museveni, whose self-imposed deadlines for crushing the LRA have been repeatedly put back, was quick to pin the blame on sloppiness by a local commander.
But analysts say the latest massacre provides a case study of the kind of tactics that have ensured the LRA's longevity, as well as flaws in the government's counter-measures.
"The LRA are terrorists and have no wish to control land or take over government so to say they are unsuccessful because they cannot take Kampala is erroneous," said political commentator Andrew Mwenda.
"They are winning in the sense that they have ensured state collapse in the north by making it impossible for government to ensure the basic right of security."
One of Africa's most feared rebel movements, the LRA is led by a former altar boy turned mystic named Joseph Kony. Although the LRA has said it is fighting for the rights of the northern Acholi people, its exact aims remain murky.
Escaped recruits say Kony transforms abducted children into ruthless killers, brainwashing them by exploiting beliefs in spirits and forcing them to indulge in fatal beatings meted out to anyone who tries to escape his ranks.
BIZARRE ARMY
Ugandans often struggle to explain how such a bizarre organization has managed to evade being wiped out by Ugandan army divisions commanded by Museveni, himself an experienced guerrilla who shot his way to power in 1986.
The answer may lie partly in the LRA's preferred tactic of attacking lightly-defended civilian targets such as camps housing more than a million people uprooted by the fighting, rather than tackling the army's tanks and infantry head on.
The army says it acknowledges that camps defended only by local militiamen are vulnerable, and is tightening procedure.
"It's a very bitter lesson we have learned that has sharpened our mind," divisional army commander George Ityang told Reuters television in Lira, referring to the latest raid.
"We are going to do more than we have done to make sure we provide maximum security for our people in the camps."
Perhaps more worryingly for the government, survivors of the attack on the Barlonyo camp said the rebels were wearing brand new uniforms and boots -- suggesting that the LRA might be being re-supplied, although it is unclear by whom.
Sudan, which Kampala has accused of backing the LRA in the past, renewed a pact with Uganda in October to cooperate in removing LRA bases from lawless southern Sudan.
But the LRA appear to be receiving new equipment from somewhere. The army says it is investigating how the rebels have obtained 12.7 mm anti-aircraft guns -- useful for fending off army helicopters -- and anti-tank rockets.
Analysts say the army, on the other hand, has been hampered by inability to pay troops on time and corruption.
The LRA has few open sympathizers in the north, where the Acholi people form the bulk of its victims, but peace activists say the army also enjoys little sympathy there. Museveni has long ruled out any talks with the rebels.
(Additional reporting by David Mwangi in Lira)
02/26/04 09:35 ET
"The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth becomes the greatest enemy of the state."
- Dr. Joseph M. Goebbels - Hitler's propaganda minister
