Abomination’: Local Belief Systems and International Justice

THE JUSTICE AND RECONCILIATION PROJECT: FIELD NOTES Liu Institute for Global Issues and the Gulu District NGO Forum Field Notes, No. 5, September 2007 ‘Abomination’: Local belief systems and international justice EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Local contexts must begin to better inform For example, the concept of kiir suggests Western-based approaches to transitional that trauma is a collective phenomenon, one justice; without them, external interventions that threatens the social reproduction of the often fail to resonate with the values, norms clan. Individualized, psychological and beliefs of victims. To illustrate this point, approaches common in the West are not this edition of Field Notes focuses on the entirely appropriate. Acholi concept of kiir , or abomination. 1 Westernized court systems may reflect Kiir is a transgression of the moral order international human rights standards and be which is believed to cause serious considered legitimate in the eyes of both the misfortune, including disease, spiritual local and international community, but fail to haunting and death. Not only has the conflict address the disruption of social relations in northern Uganda created the conditions caused by kiir . Supplementary acts such as that have allowed these transgressions to cleansings will continue regardless of court occur; the conflict has also been called an results. abomination in and of itself. A curse on the people of Acholi and consequent mass This is also the case in terms of displacement are thought to have multiplied development and the return of internally acts of abomination as well as reduced the displaced persons to their villages. Persons capacity to deal with them: a cleansing have been reluctant to return to their villages ceremony must be performed in order to and rebuild local economies until the rectify the impact of kiir . spiritual dimensions of kiir have been addressed. The concept of kiir provides important insight into how social roles and relations of This Field Note attempts to bring the reader women and men, young and old are closer to an understanding of local belief structured and reproduced. Although kiir is systems. Gaining insight into these beliefs not often committed intentionally, in extreme can aid international justice systems to cases it can be an act that enables the better reflect the lived realities of the victim powerless to exercise agency: by cursing population. others, one calls for the reparation of harmed social relations. If the purpose of transitional justice is to bring about a social transformation in post-conflict societies, then the concept of kiir helps to unlock how such a transformation may take place. 1 All research data collected on kiir was done in largely rural areas where the majority of the war- affected population in northern Uganda lives in internally displaced persons camps. Field Note 5 INTRODUCTION The mego ’s words also point to the position Museveni and Kony are sons of Uganda. of women and children in Acholi society and We the mothers of Uganda are sad in the greater moral order. While the term because these two brothers cannot mego literally means ‘mother,’ it is reconcile. They are men, and they have specifically a term of respect granted to never experienced labour pains. But it is we women once they have earned that position. the women who suffer most as a result of Women are the bearers and caregivers of their fighting. If they cannot reach an Acholi children, who in turn have the agreement, then may they be guilty for responsibility to maintain and eventually shedding the blood of the Acholi, and a 2 reproduce that order. But amidst a war that curse upon them. has been characterized by its use of kidnapped children brutally indoctrinated into The preceding words were spoken by an lives of sexual servitude and military battles, Acholi mego (mother) during a JRP- the reproduction of the Acholi moral order organized dialogue on the ongoing northern has become incredibly difficult. Meanwhile, Uganda peace talks. Her frustration bubbled in the displacement camps across northern over as a war-affected Acholi, but also as Uganda, mass crowding and despair have someone recognizing that the allowed incidents of kiir to overwhelm consequences of disorder and violence have everyday life. fallen disproportionately upon the women and children of Acholi-land. In the cosmology of those Amidst the context of a 20-year-long war, adversely affected by the Yoweri Museveni and Joseph Kony (the war, kiir is a concept President of Uganda and leader of the central to the moral order Lord’s Resistance Army, respectively) were cursed by this mego in a very serious and governing social roles and purposeful attempt to gain power over her relationships. It should intolerable situation. Having no other avenue thus be seriously of agency, this mego invoked a curse and considered by all parties thus called upon the spirit world to intervene. This invocation is an Acholi curse, which is concerned with justice. also known in Luo as a type of kiir . Throughout the course of several JRP Aside from the kiir of the mego ’s curse, research phases (2005-present), it has many abominations exist. The act of forcing someone into marriage or sex, particularly in become evident that certain acts in Acholi 4 are considered to be taboo and, if steps are places considered sacred, is considered a not taken to cleanse a perpetrator of one of grave kiir . The anger of jogi (gods; singular these abominations, misfortune is thought to jok ), the spirit ancestors, and the ghosts of result. Caused by the angered and the dead can only be appeased by specific displeased spirits of gods, ancestors, or cleansing rituals. Likewise, the burning and ghosts of the dead, misfortune often befalls destruction of property, fighting at water neither the perpetrator nor the victim, but the sources, and domestic disputes are all children of either, threatening the known to disrupt the cosmological balance reproduction of the clan. Women become between the living and the spirit worlds. barren, children fall ill: sickness and death These kiir and more have commonly are the products of abominations that have occurred during the conflict, particularly in not been appeased by sacrifice. 3 context of crowded internally displaced persons’ camps. And as research conducted by JRP has discovered, nearly all war- 2 affected Acholi believe that the elders must Statement by mego at the JRP Dialogue on Peace Talks, Padibe, 3 November 2006. 3 Some respondents made the observation that 4 Sacred places are where gods, or jogi , are children of perpetrators suffer greater thought to dwell, including near sources of water, consequences than those of victims. under big trees and in the forest. 2 Justice and Reconciliation Project cleanse the vast amounts of kiir committed METHODS during the war, lest more death and misfortune occur. The primary research for this field note was carried out by way of in-depth structured Beyond the now relatively well-known interviews with 48 people located in 3 process of mato oput and debates about the internally displaced persons’ camps (Anaka, most appropriate avenues for justice and Amuru and Koch Goma), over the period of reconciliation in Acholi-land, little is known in June and July of 2006. Respondents were the transitional justice field about what asked to classify and explain the gravity of motivates Acholi to seek out local justice crimes. During the initial research phase, it mechanisms or how Acholi cope with the became clear that certain abominations unimaginable consequences of the conflict. were themselves considered criminal and This Field Note aims to bridge the conversely criminal acts considered knowledge gap by exploring the basics of abominations. 5 Following this phase, Acholi morality as it relates to the conflict. researchers asked respondents to explain How do the Acholi experience and explain their knowledge of abominations and to everyday conflicts and misfortunes? How do describe kiir that has occurred during or as a the interactions of the physical and spiritual result of the conflict (specifically, worlds influence Acholi approaches to abominations occurring in the camps). Eight justice and reconciliation? Why is it interviews with local leaders, lawmakers, important to recognize the local context in and NGO workers supplemented these the design of international human rights interviews. All respondents were identified based approaches? using cluster and snowballing methods. The interviews were conducted in Acholi and The elderly mego ’s curse gives us a great responses were translated into English by amount of insight into these questions of the research officers. justice and reconciliation. It helps us to understand how the process of justice is In addition, 49 local rituals were recorded by initiated in Acholi-land, and by whom. It is JRP focal point researchers and volunteers not the elders, it is not the International from the camp in Anaka, Amuru and Criminal Court, and it is not politicians and Kalongo. These focal points reside in the diplomats that initiate the restoration of camps and were given written materials and relationships in Acholi-land – it is everyday open instructions to record any rituals that people who take drastic spiritual actions in occurred in the camp, why the rituals were an effort to find meaning in chaos, and to being held, the processes and procedures make the intolerable tolerable. involved, why specific items were used, and the consequences of not performing the In the cosmology of those adversely affected rituals. The rituals took place in various by the war, kiir is a concept central to the locations as determined with the guidance of moral order governing social roles and elders. relationships. It should thus be seriously and rigorously considered by all parties The data was further supplemented by concerned with transitional justice in Acholi- interviews conducted during separate JRP land.

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