THE JUSTICE AND RECONCILIATION PROJECT: FIELD NOTES

Liu Institute for Global Issues and the Gulu District NGO Forum Field Notes, No. 5, September 2007

‘’: 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 . 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 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 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. We are particularly interested in how research phases. An additional 5 in-depth perceptions of kiir (as defined and described follow-up interviews with camp residents by Acholi elders and everyday people) have (namely elders) was conducted in early been shaped by the conflict and have August of 2007 to clarify key concepts. provided a framework of causation: abominations have served as a tool that enables people to cope intellectually with the constant presence of illness, death, and misfortune.

5 For example, rape, arson and murder.

3 Field Note 5

KIIR AND ITS CONSEQUENCES more generally to sickness and death. ‘The greater portion of the punishment will befall We were forced to walk over dead bodies. I the perpetrator and little will befall the was in fear that one time it would bring to me victim,’ explained one young man to a JRP problems…While home for about a period of researcher. ‘The punishment for the kiir will four months, I started experiencing bad be exacted in differing degrees of severity or dreams and thinking of what I had gone enormity. There can be variations in the through and how I could gain a sense of punishment experienced. For instance, the control over my life. 6 victim of the kiir may have a sickly child, while the perpetrator may be unable to bear The formerly-abducted child who uttered children or lose children that are born until a those words was describing one ritual takes place.’ 8 consequence of walking over dead bodies. Yet there are many more kiir that have been It is noteworthy that these consequences difficult to avoid in the conflict. seem to afflict the children of perpetrators and victims to a greater extent than the Respondents to the question ‘Do you know perpetrators themselves. ‘If a taboo is not of any kiir that has been committed?’ were addressed, usually the children suffer. It can able to cite large lists of abominations. cause sickness or even death depending on These include, but are not limited to: the the kind of abomination,’ 9 claimed one burning and destruction of property, the respondent. Certainly, as far as the children breaking of vows, fighting at the well or other are concerned, a possible consequence of sources of water, fighting in the garden, the kiir of their parents and elders was having sex in the bush, rape, incest, murder, identified as disease and even death. ‘If walking over corpses, mishandling corpses abominations are not addressed, they can (or neglecting to give the deceased a proper cause sicknesses that come through burial), throwing food, money or feces in swelling of the body,’ one person explained anger, beating one’s genitals, domestic to us. ‘If a person gets diarrhea, he or she quarrels between husbands and wives, consequently dies.’ 10 defecating in food, and eating ash. Several of these abominations were also Kiir prevalent in the conflict were often documented during the research phase of described in terms of the desecration of the JRP’s flagship report, Roco Wat I Acoli .7 dead. These include killing one’s own relatives, walking over dead bodies, forcing A purposeful kiir severs people to eat human flesh, eat meals on social connections and corpses, and drink human blood. At massacre and ambush sites, where the begs that they be sheer number of people killed made it reformed. impossible to bury every body as local custom dictates, spirits still linger and have The consequences of these kiir are not been put to rest. It is known that corpses considered to be dangerous and are have also been deliberately thrown into the therefore taken quite seriously. The most bush in attempts to set angry spirits upon common responses to the question: ‘what the perpetrators of mass murder. These very happens if a kiir that has been committed is explicit abominations lend credence to the not addressed?’ were that it would lead to claim that the war in northern Uganda is the death of an infant or child, would make itself a kiir . someone infertile or barren, or would lead

6 Interview with formerly abducted person, Anaka Camp, 2 February 2007. 8 Interview with formerly abducted person, Amuru 7 Liu Institute for Global Issues, Gulu District Camp, 4 July 2006. NGO Forum, Ker Kwaro Acholi, 2005. Roco Wat I 9 Interview with former soldier, Anaka Camp, 20 Acoli: Restoring Relationships in Acholi-land: June 2006. Traditional Approaches to Justice and 10 Interview with displaced person, Anaka Camp, Reintegration. 2005. 21 June 2006.

4 Justice and Reconciliation Project

Kiir is not a new concept. Based on war - mass abduction, rape, violence, forced fieldwork undertaken during the period of displacement and the consequent life in IDP October 1949 to August of 1950, F.K. camps – kiir is very much a part of everyday Girling’s study of the Acholi also life for war-affected Acholi. emphasized the strict taboo against incest in Acholi society. 11 Unlike Euro-American Of the Acholi interviewed about their understandings of incest, in the Acholi detailed knowledge of kiir , every single context incest refers to relationships that respondent was able to name and detail occur within the same village lineage or several abominations, while 84% of clan. In the context of displacement camps, respondents identified kiir specifically linked where a generation of young people have to the conflict and life in the camps. The kiir been raised, there have been frequent of murder, of witnessing atrocities, or of occurrences of incest due to the fact that mishandling dead bodies can lead to cen , clan lineages are no longer clearly (ghostly vengeance), a phenomenon now delineated to those of marriageable age. well-documented in Acholi-land. 14 Those Many respondents reported discovering that who have killed or been forced to kill; those this kiir had occurred. who have witnessed atrocities; those who have passed by places where they have Years prior to the conflict in northern occurred – even those people related to Uganda, the famous Acholi poet and such people - are vulnerable to relentless anthropologist Okot p’Bitek described the haunting by the ghosts of the dead. They curse of kiir as the ‘deliberate act by a suffer from nightmares, frightening visions person who found himself or herself in an and relentless anxiety. intolerable social position.’ 12 While most kiir are not deliberate (for example, incest), Abominations are known to anger or uttering a curse is. P’Bitek described the displease the ancestor spirits and certain purposeful kiir as a person’s action of last jogi (for example, many jogi reside by water, resort when confronted with an intolerable where it is forbidden to quarrel, by certain social situation; committing kiir was seen as rocks, hills, forests, big trees and bushes). the only way out of a situation requiring Known by different names in different immediate attention from others. regions, similar characters appear throughout Acholi-land: ‘There are different A purposeful kiir severs social connections types of ayweya , such as kulu which is and begs that they be reformed. Curses are associated with water ( kulu can be used to uttered when the social order is disturbed, denote the guard spirit or the jok as the such as when a wife refuses to have sex same word is used); lakwena which protects with her husband, or when a son disobeys or looks after combatants; and, tipo ngur his parents. A serious abomination involves which is a general spirit that causes the exposure of a parent’s genitals to his or miscarriages. The jok punishes humans, her child; wagging a penis or striking below through the ayweya , for the kiir they have the belly button as if to say, in anger, ‘I deny committed,’ 15 explained one informant. It is that you came from here.’ ‘It was believed these spiritual forces that bring sickness, that the anger of the parents which misfortune and death upon the community expressed itself in these acts affected the when kiir is committed. While visiting a son immediately, causing him to become camp, one JRP researcher observed, ‘the insane and impotent,’ noted p’Bitek. 13 In the elders believe the high rate of death and intolerable social situations caused by the suffering among the people of the camp is

11 F.K. Girling, The Acholi of Uganda (Colonial Office, Colonial Research Studies No. 30), London: Her Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1960, p. 14 See, for example: Justice and Reconciliation 65. Project, ‘Alice’s Story: Cultural and Spiritual 12 Okot p’Bitek, Religion of the Central Luo, Dimensions of Reconciliation in Northern Nairobi: East African Literature Bureau, 1971, p. Uganda,’ Field Notes , no. 1, February 2006. 145. 15 Interview with formerly abducted person, 13 ibid , p. 150. Amuru Camp, 4 July 2006.

5 Field Note 5 caused by the gods, angry because of the victim of the kiir .19 During the research evil acts that were occurring in the area.’ 16 period, focal point persons documented ceremonies that included tum kulu (for girls who fought at the well), 20 tumu bedo ki wat The elders believe the 21 high rate of death and (for the case of incest), tum kir cele ki cente/lim (for people who threw money at suffering among the each other), 22 tumu butu latin ma obutu pat people of the camp is ki mine (cleansing a woman who had spent the night separate from her breast-feeding caused by the gods, angry 23 because of the evil acts baby after a fight with her husband). Frequent occurrences of death and accident that were occurring in the were also prevalent at a particular spot area. where a massacre had happened. ‘The traditional ritual for this kiir is moyo cere , As the elders inhabit social strata which involves bringing together the clans cosmologically closer to the ancestors, they heads of the affected area to undertake the may act as mediators and are therefore ritual. A goat is slaughtered during the entrusted with the appeasement of the spirit ritual,’ 24 a respondent described. world when an abomination has been committed. While observing the cleansing But daily survival comes first before costly ceremony tumu cere , one camp resident feasts and sacrifices, as Finnström has 25 said, ‘The elected chairman of the elders noted. Daily survival is a challenge in the holds the goat by the rope and blesses it. An displacement camps, and thus addressing elder is supposed to do this because it is an kiir has proven extremely difficult for those evil spirit that a young person cannot who believe in its power to harm and disrupt. manage and the blessing of a young person One elder, when asked to describe how the cannot set off the cleansing.’ 17 camp setting has affected the incidents and resolution of kiir , had this to say: Elderly respondents described common cases of kiir that they had been asked to People used to live in their homesteads and resolve. ‘After we have listened to the facts this made it very easy to perform cleansing of the case, we ask for a sheep or a goat in ceremonies since all could easily be order to carry out the cleansing. Some of gathered to attend such ceremonies. This these crimes include, for instance, throwing camp setting has seen the people scattered food at another person, throwing a hoe; all over, making it very difficult to create a throwing feces at a person, beating a person forum for these issues to be settled… All those things that are to be sued to perform up until he defecates and beating a woman tumu kiir [cleansing abominations] have at the well. Others may include stealing food from a granary, deliberately burning somebody’s house or somebody’s garden. 19 In some circumstances, local herbs are used to All these require cleansing,’ 18 explained one cleanse abominations, particularly as people in elder. the camps are unable to afford the animals required. This substitution is often considered to be ineffective. Specific ceremonies exist for each act of 20 abomination, with many requiring the Witnessed by camp focal point, Amuru Camp, 1 February 2006. sacrifice of a goat or a ram in the presence 21 Witnessed by camp focal point, Anaka Camp, of the perpetrator and, if applicable, the 9 January 2006. 22 Witnessed by camp focal point, Anaka Camp, 26 February 2006. 23 Witnessed by camp focal point, Anaka Camp, 8 May 2006. 16 Observed by JRP, Anaka Camp, 17 24 Interview with displaced person, Amuru Camp, September 2005. 4 July 2006. 17 Witnessed by camp focal point, Amuru Camp, 25 Sverker Finnström, Living with Bad February 2006. Surroundings: War and Existential Uncertainty in 18 Interview with elder, Koch Goma, 8 February Acholiland, Northern Uganda , Uppsala: Uppsala 2007. University Press, 2003, p. 204.

6 Justice and Reconciliation Project

been lost. When you have been displaced, regulate human conduct.’ 29 He demystified you become very helpless. We have lost all witchcraft for a non-Zande audience by that we had like the white hens, and the suggesting that the interaction of the black ones which are needed to perform supernatural and natural worlds through these rituals. All these things are actually 26 witchcraft ‘explains why events are harmful missing. to man and not how they happen.’ 30 In the same way, we can approach kiir and its In one case documented by a focal point consequences as a rational phenomenon of person in one of the camps, a cleansing cause and effect. In this way, those who ceremony was performed for a woman who suffer misfortune are able to employ had cursed another woman and her children strategies of control over their lives instead at the spring. After fetching water with a jerry of feeling powerless to the course of can and a saucepan at the spring, she left sorrowful events. the saucepan behind by accident. Another woman had taken the saucepan by the time For example, a formerly abducted soldier she had walked back to retrieve it. ‘She may suffer from post-traumatic stress angrily cursed the person who took the disorder or a child may die of malaria in a saucepan and these were her words, ‘she displacement camp in northern Uganda. Yet who took my sauce pan that was given to for the afflicted, the meaning of these me by the donors should be harmed and ailments may be found in the interaction of even her children. The sauce pan she took the spirit realm with that of the living: the should be used to cook food at the burial soldier may be haunted by cen and the child and funeral services of those people.’ In the may have died because of a kiir committed context of the camps, where material by his or her parents. These ailments may possessions are hard to come by, conflict be alleviated, to some extent, by ceremony can easily arise when items upon which 27 and mediation with the spirit world. In this people are dependant go missing. way, Acholi, like the Zande, interpret unfortunate events through a framework that does not always mesh with medical and SPIRITS, SEX AND MORALITY: KIIR psychological ways of knowing. These AS AGENCY frameworks of spirituality and medicine do not preclude each other, but instead must be Barrenness is as a result of the things that considered together in any social were done in the bush that were kiir. 28 intervention in Acholi-land.

Beliefs in the power of the supernatural In the communal clan system of Acholi-land world over everyday life are not unique to an individual abomination or curse northern Uganda. In 1937, E.E. Evans- jeopardizes the well-being of the entire Pritchard’s definitive Witchcraft, Oracles and community, living and dead. After taboos Magic Among the Azande interpreted the have been breached, the brunt of the notion of witchcraft as a system of beliefs consequences is felt by mothers as their that explained unfortunate events in the children die and they themselves become Azande culture of central Africa. Like kiir , barren; women are prevented from fulfilling Evans-Pritchard hypothesized that witchcraft their roles as the bearers and nurturers of beliefs ‘embrace a system of values which the next generation of the clan. As a result, the belief in kiir actively enforces the 26 Interview with elder, Anaka Camp, 8 August communal social and moral order and 2007. promotes good behaviour. If kiir is 27 Witnessed by camp focal point, Anaka Camp, committed, social pollution results and steps 1 April 2006. Unfortunately in this case, by the must be taken to resolve the situation time the woman who had stolen the saucepan immediately, not only to restore the harmony had admitted it and requested a cleansing ceremony, her child had already become ill. The child died while the elders were searching for a 29 E.E. Evans-Pritchard, Witchcraft, Oracles and goat to use. Magic Among the Azande , New York: Oxford 28 Interview with formerly abducted person, University Press, 1937, p. 63. Amuru Camp, 4 July 2006. 30 ibid , p. 72.

7 Field Note 5 of the clan, but to ensure that gods and immediately, resulting in deaths, especially spirits do not prevent the reproduction of the of the children of the woman who did it.’ 33 clan. This adds yet another dimension to the war that is often described as a war fought by Sex and the Reproduction of Society children. Even in the moral realm, it is the children who suffer the most for the sins of In Mozambique, grievances associated with their elders. the war were suppressed in a concerted effort to ‘move on’ through forgetfulness, as ‘If a kiir is not addressed, then you can be stipulated by a government-sponsored possessed by evil spirits that can prevent amnesty. However, social discontent has you from having children. These spirits are manifested through widespread spirit called ayweya. They watch out for people possession; one of the most common results who engage in kiir . These spirits will block of which is sexual dysfunction. Victor Igreja your ability to have children,’ 34 insisted one documented this phenomenon in young man. While the Gamba spirits in Gorongosa, Mozambique. Magamba spirits Mozambique prevent sexual organs from are known to affect women far more than functioning, so too the consequences of kiir men, and are believed to be the spirits of include infertility, miscarriages, and the soldiers who died in the war and were not deaths of children. Social and physiological properly buried. 31 Where the war-affected reproduction is thus halted by social un- are officially advised to forget the horrors of cleanliness, and the next generation is the civil war, possession by magamba spirits prevented from reaching adulthood. bypasses this silence because the experience of possession ‘must be publicly Spirits … present a disclosed, acknowledged and repaired. In this way, magamba spirits also present a potential source for a potential source for a peaceful resolution of peaceful resolution of the the histories of abuse, denial and 32 histories of abuse, denial concealment that prevail in Gorongosa,’ he and concealment that writes. In addition to the effect of spirit possession itself, a primary affliction prevail. resultant from magamba possession is, as noted above, the blockage of reproductive -Victor Igreja functions. Like the mego who cursed Kony and Similarly, it is reproduction (physiological Museveni, Girling observed that Acholi and cultural) that is the most harmed by the taboos are related to the position of women act of kiir . The next generation of Acholi as child-bearers and caregivers of the clan’s cannot exist if the primary consequences of next generation. An Acholi woman is not a abomination are the deaths of children, woman if she has not yet had children; her sexual impotence, and infertility amongst the social function has not yet been realised. ‘I adults. After recounting a story of a woman believe that the observances of both women throwing food and a pot in extreme anger and men are connected with the fear of and frustration with her husband (this act barrenness and sterility, which are regarded constituting an abomination), Girling stated as the greatest afflictions any person can that ‘it was believed that ill-health and other suffer among the Acholi,’ wrote Girling. misfortune followed the act of kiir ‘They also reflect the sexual division of labour in the society, and are an affirmation 31 Victor Igreja, ‘Gamba Spirits and the Homines of the adulthood of an individual…The Aperti: Soci-Cultural Approaches to Deal with household…is the woman’s main sphere of Legacies of the Civil War in Gorongosa, Mozambique,’ Paper presented at International conference on Building a Future on Peace and Justice, ‘Workshop 10 - Alternative Approaches to Dealing with the Past,, Nuremberg, 25-27 June 33 Okot p’Bitek, 1971, p. 147. 2007, p. 6. 34 Interview with formerly abducted person, 32 Igreja, 2007, pg. 7. Amuru Camp, 4 July 2006.

8 Justice and Reconciliation Project influence and where she attains her intervention of the spirit world through the maximum social status.’ 35 act of kiir is an expression of this agency.

Agency through Morality In situations of

The importance of social codes is paralleled extreme social crisis, in Mozambique and Angola. Honwana human beings draw describes war as a space where social rules upon their beliefs in are routinely violated, but still result in social their social and spirit pollution. ‘This pollution is believed to arise from contact with death and bloodshed,’ she worlds in order to elucidates. ‘Individuals who have been master what little they exposed to war, who killed or saw people can of their own lives. being killed, are regarded as polluted. The ‘wrong-doings of the war’ are a dangerous In Sierra Leone, Rosalind Shaw describes form of disorder. Those people who were the methods of the so-called ‘juju warriors’ caught up in it are contaminated by the as an example of such agency. ‘Rather than spirits of the dead and are potential 36 anachronistic residues of a primal past,… contaminators of the social body.’ As in techniques of Darkness and Closure Mozambique and Angola, the social body [shielding and concealing techniques] in the must be cleansed for relationships to be rebel war embodied both ritual memory and, restored in Acholi-land. for the kamajos [a civilian militia], and authorizing discourse,’ she explains. 40 This ‘She gave birth to eleven children and has 37 theory differed greatly from those of other only two left,’ one respondent told us about outside observers of the conflict, who were another Acholi woman. In situations of known to dismiss Sierra Leone as, simply, extreme social crisis, human beings draw ‘weird.’ upon beliefs in their social and spirit worlds in order to master what little they can in their Far from being a romanticized ideal of own lives. During the height of the war, 90% perfect and traditional justice, the cleansing of the Acholi population was forced to live in of kiir belongs to the people who practice it. displacement camps where crowding, chaos Extensive research and local promotion of and abject poverty increased the incidents of the process of mato oput has been criticized kiir to an unprecedented level. A Rwot in by some academics as influencing the one of these camps lamented that acts of frequency and form of its practice in Acholi- kiir had greatly increased. He explained: land and compromising its authenticity. 41 ‘Water sources are so scarce, yet with a lot The assumption made by that criticism is not of population [that needs] to access them. that traditional or local approaches are This has seen for people struggling and inadequate or bad, but that they are fighting to get water; an act that is 38 inherently invalid because they have been tantamount to kiir .’ Acholi are thus agents manipulated by indigenous power over the one aspect of life that they control: structures. Yet while policy-makers should of the moral order. In his definitive study of course take care to read into political Acholi-land, Sverker Finnström noted that rhetoric, they must remember that cultural the Acholi were constantly expressing practice is always directed by human ‘agency in the face of disempowering circumstances.’ 39 Requesting the 40 Rosalind Shaw, ‘Robert Kaplan and “Juju Journalism” in Sierra Leone: The Primitivizing of an African Conflict’ in Magic and Modernity: 35 Girling, 1960, p.160-161. Interfaces of Revelation and Concealment, edited 36 Honwana, 2006, p.105. by Birgit Meyer and Peter Pels, Stanford: 37 Interview with mego , Anaka Camp, 21 June Stanford University Press, 2003, p.91. 2006. 41 See, for example: Tim Allen, Trial Justice: The 38 Interview with elder, Anaka Camp, 8 August International Criminal Court and the Lord’s 2007. Resistance Army , London: Zed Books, pp. 128- 39 Finnström, 2003, p. 15. 168.

9 Field Note 5 agency. So whether or not a ‘traditional’ the same time.’ 43 In fact, outside of Western practice is historically informed or is a culture, somatisation is a common theme. project imagined by elites is irrelevant: the So too in Acholi-land. fact remains that it exists, and if the local populace expresses agency by adopting it, Individualized then so be it. At best, this criticism supposes that the Acholi cannot make wise decisions psychological for themselves; the outsiders must tell them interventions may not what is genuine Acholi justice. prove effective when kiir has occurred and the spirit Unlike everyday secular lives in the Western world, the spirit world in Acholi is ubiquitous. world disrupts the well- Where most Westerners largely restrict their being of the community. understandings of cosmology to the private sphere, most Acholi are daily surrounded by Individualized psychological interventions spiritual forces. As such, Acholi must take may not prove effective when kiir has great care to ensure that the material and occurred and the spirit world disrupts the spiritual worlds are in balance. well-being of the community. As Finnström denotes, a ceremony to ‘chase away’ cen ‘…is not only one of individual healing but KIIR AND TRANSITIONAL JUSTICE also a process of socialization in which the victim is incorporated and reconciled with 44 Psycho-Social Healing and Reintegration the community of both living and dead.’

Alcinda Honwana’s studies of Mozambique This occurred in Sierra Leone as well, where and Angola document the phenomenon of spirit mediumship and its accompanying spirit possession. In Angola, it is the rituals helped externalize past violence – kazumbi (the spirits of the dead) that haunt and it was much preferred by locals over people, and we can draw many parallels Western psychotherapy. Reporting on the with the spirits of the murdered that cause experience of the Sierra Leone truth cen in northern Uganda. ‘Such spirits are commission, Rosalind Shaw notes that believed to contaminate and threaten not ‘Western psychotherapy and truth only the individual soldier but also his family, commissions are imbued with the authority relatives, and neighbours, ’42 Honwana of Western science, liberal models of social explains. As in Angola, sufferers of cen are and political change, and the political often ostracized by their families, relatives economy of humanitarian assistance. The and neighbours for fear that cen will spread. case of Sierra Leone demonstrates, however, that even when a truth commission After the 2004 tsunami that devastated is demanded and embraced by local NGOs, much of south-east Asia, Western doctors its failure to take seriously and to build upon local practices of healing and reintegration and counsellors braced for the ensuing 45 epidemic of mental illness. But these experts can undermine its effectiveness.’ were unprepared for the onslaught of somatisation - the bodily manifestation of Despite Shaw’s insight, most studies psychological malcontent: this phenomenon regarding the state of mental health in is not manifest in Western societies. As one northern Uganda continue to be couched journalist noted, ‘The simple but surprising almost exclusively in the clinical language of truth appears to be that symptoms of Western medicine. While many of these psychological trauma can be both culturally created and utterly real to the individual at 43 Ethan Watters, ‘Suffering Differently’, The New York Times, 12 August 2007. 44 Finnström, 2003, p. 219. 45 Rosalind Shaw, ‘Rethinking Truth and 42 Alcinda Honwana, Child Soldiers in Africa , Reconciliation Commissions: Lessons from Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, Sierra Leone,’ United States Institute of Peace, 2006, p. 105. Emphasis added. February 2005, p. 7.

10 Justice and Reconciliation Project studies recognize the mitigating factor that The consequences of kiir have high-level culture may play in the symptoms, diagnosis implications for peace outside of the camps and treatment of illness, explanations of how as well. It is alleged that a prominent elder ‘culture’ affects experiences of suffering are from Gulu town displayed his penis while vague and largely unsatisfactory. A recent condemning LRA rebels, and that his wife study employed a ‘psychologist with showed her breasts. This happened after experience in northern Uganda [who] local elders apparently gave their blessing to provided background training on PTSD and the rebellion; a blessing that was not depression symptoms’ 46 to interviewers retractable. And according to Finnström, ‘the conducting a study in Gulu, Kitgum, Lira and mere rumours of the curse may indeed have Soroti districts. The study found that 74.3% encouraged the rebels to increase their of respondents met post-traumatic stress violence against elders, healers and other syndrome (PTSD) symptom criteria. This is arbitrators of Acholi cosmology.’ 49 a significant number, and yet the exploration of how northern Ugandans themselves Respondents to our questions most often perceive their suffering is missing from the insisted, whether they were elders or not, analysis. Any design for the treatment of the that it is the role of elders and not of 74.3% of PTSD sufferers, therefore, may outsiders to address instances of require a more extensive consultation with abominations: ‘We atekeres [elders in the afflicted. charge of cultural matters] have issues that we can handle. If, for example, a man has Justice Mechanisms fought with his wife or a house has been burnt and the parties concerned wish to In recent years, transitional justice has settle it out of court, then we the elders find tended to interpret local justice mechanisms a way of resolving it traditionally, like making from schema based exclusively on sacrifices so that the evil deed does not international legal standards. For the war- bring twoo akwota 50 to the children. Any affected persons of the societies in case that involves traditional Acholi transition, the result has been the use of ceremonies is usually handled by us in the traditional justice mechanisms stripped of community.’ 51 their meaning and lacking relevance for 47 locals and grassroots actors. Rosalind When asked if it is appropriate to address Shaw has written extensively about Sierra kiir through the court system in Uganda, Leone’s Truth and Reconciliation 97% of respondents argued that court action Commission, but also about truth is not sufficient to satisfy the anger and commissions more generally. In referring to irritation of the spirits offended by kiir . broad conversations on transitional justice in Instead, they claimed, it is necessary for all of its forms, Shaw astutely observes, ‘the cleansing ceremonies to be performed by question of how transitional justice the elders. If not, death will result – mechanisms interrelate with local practices regardless of any legal interference taken to 48 is missing from this discussion.’ address the abominations. This approach, it should be noted, does not necessarily preclude the use of other justice systems, but acts in addition to them. As we were told 46 See, for example: Patrick Vinck, Phuong N. about a fight that happened at a local well, Pham, Eric Stover and Harvey M. Weinstein, for example, the police addressed the legal ‘Exposure to War Crimes and Implications for component relating to assault, but the Peace Building in Northern Uganda,’ Journal of the American Medical Association , Vol. 298, No. 5, 1 August 2007. 47 For example, gacaca courts in Rwanda and special community courts in East Timor were 49 Finnström, 2003, pp. 283-284. radically modified in order to conform to universal 50 Twoo akwota is a sickness characterized by standards of due process. Little to nothing is swelling of the body, and is believed to result known about the spiritual or cultural relevance of from kiir such as burning down a house. either according to local cosmologies. 51 Interview with elder, Koch Goma, 11 February 48 Shaw, 2005, p. 3 . 2007.

11 Field Note 5 traditional leaders addressed the kiir curses and ancestor spirits. He noted that in component. 52 the Tonkolili District (where he was present for TRC hearings), a number of taboos Respondents commonly argued that while (such as stealing, sexual offences, murder, kiir and legally-defined crimes often overlap, etc.) could cause death to an entire family if they are resolved in much different ways. cleansing and purification rituals were not ‘Kiir has to do with cooling down tempers held to appease the spirit world. Despite through ritual,’ one young man explained. these deeply ingrained beliefs and fears Comments like this one give us insight into held by the local population (and thus their the needs, desires, and expectations that ability to compel confessions), they were not the war-affected have for justice addressed to any significant extent in the mechanisms in northern Uganda. It appears local TRC hearings. He concluded that that multiple mechanisms are necessary, ‘ritual, at its most effective, has the power to possible, and desired. One person explained transform perceptions and emotions and the kiir and crime of rape: ‘Taking the case therefore situations, and it is for this reason to court is not enough, because once a that it ought to be taken seriously by truth woman is raped in the bush she doesn’t commissions.’ 55 believe she can conceive. To take away the negative association, it is necessary to do a Return cleansing ceremony so that she will have the ability to give birth.’ 53 Policy-makers The effects of kiir have recently begun to should thus ensure that locally-owned manifest themselves insofar as camp approaches to justice and reconciliation are departures are concerned. As the Juba talks given equal weight in any wider-reaching continue and the security situation in post-conflict justice strategies. northern Uganda improves, some Acholi are being given return packages (typically The importance of ritual to consisting of gardening implements, iron sheeting, seeds, and mattresses) and respondents gives us granted leave to go home. However, insight into the needs, returning home has proven not so easy. The desires, and expectations inhabitants of one area close to the that the war-affected have Sudanese border were given packages and instructed to leave the camp. But as an for justice mechanisms in NGO worker discovered, they made no such northern Uganda. move to return home. When the worker asked why they would not return to their The importance of redressing abomination village, the reply was simple: because the through local means is not unique to the ghosts of the dead killed and improperly situation in northern Uganda. We can glean buried over the course of the war lingered in important lessons from the post-war their villages. Thus we can begin to situations in other nations. In a reflection on comprehend that development and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission economic concerns do not have a monopoly held in Sierra Leone after that country’s civil on the worries of Acholi people; conflict is war, Tim Kelsall remarked that the ‘truth- wrought with intellectual and spiritual crises telling component of the public hearings as well. might have been more successful had they been more heavily invested with ritual In the same area, people were afraid that practice’ 54 that resonated with local beliefs in any attempt at reconstruction would not bear fruit until cleansing ceremonies to remove an old curse had been conducted. The Rwot of the area cursed his people to never have 52 Interview with women’s sergeant, Amuru schools or cattle in an attempt to gain Camp, 5 July 2006. 53 Interview with elder, Amuru Camp, 20 June 2006. Commission in Sierra Leone,’ Human Rights 54 Tim Kelsall, ‘Truth, Lies, Ritual: Preliminary Quarterly 27 (2005), p. 385. Reflections on the Truth and Reconciliation 55 Kelsall, 2005, p. 390.

12 Justice and Reconciliation Project control over the high level of cattle theft and cultural and physiological reproduction of child abduction from school yards that communities by causing barrenness and the beleaguered the clan. deaths of the children, the next generation. Reproducing the moral order is not always in Fear of the improperly buried –a serious kiir the interests of Acholi women. As a large in Acholi culture– has led to an increasing number of kiir concern sex and gender demand for moyo piny (the ceremony of relations, the autonomy of women is cleansing the area) from NGOs to open up regularly compromised. As one elder told us, roads that were otherwise avoided, and to ‘many women are hesitant to have sex with prepare land for agricultural production their spouses since they fear that they will considered contaminated to date. acquire AIDS from their cheating husbands…This kind of denial is kiir because in Acholi it is not allowed that a RECONCILING LOCAL AND woman refuses sex in marriage.’ 58 INTERNATIONAL NORMS

The importance of recognizing kiir and CONCLUSIONS: RE-THINKING factoring it into transitional justice policies RECONCILIATION (including policies for development and reconstruction) is that social roles and On June 29 th of 2007, representatives from relations are guided by it. If seeking to the Lord’s Resistance Army and the transform social roles and relations in a way Government of Uganda signed an that reduces conflict and promotes equality, agreement on reconciliation and then kiir is a useful concept to understand accountability with regards to the 21-year the nuances of local dynamics. conflict in northern Uganda. The agreement resolves to hold consultations and develop In comparison, the Special Court of Sierra proposals for mechanisms that will Leone has been criticized for under- implement, amongst other things, traditional appreciating the social complexity of juju justice into the wider peace and justice and the importance of secret societies in the process. social organisation of many parts of the 56 Sierra Leonean population. James In order to develop justice recommendations Cockayne has concluded that in order to in northern Uganda, it is important to prevent the local community from feeling understand what motivates people in alienated from the morally transformative seeking justice for themselves and their project of the trials, it would be better for the communities. Acholi culture, like all cultures, is Court ‘to accommodate the secret a project that is constantly redefined, fluid and societies…but to soundly condemn those contested. It is particularly in times of crisis that practices of the societies, such as ritual the human resource of culture is drawn upon in killing, that contribute to the violation of the order to make sense of the world and ultimate values of the community.’ 57 subsequently control it. If outsiders find kiir to be a superstitious concept laden in primitive

ignorance, they might be asked to remember that However, local norms that violate myths are not fixed in meaning; they express international human rights ones must be present concerns 59 reconciled. One does not need to look deep into the consequences of abomination to As the belief in kiir shows us, designing see who shoulders the burden of the acts: interventions through surveys and Western women and children. Like the magamba understandings of justice and personhood spirits in Mozambique, Acholi ancestors, cannot always prove effective. Without spirits of the dead and jogi prevent the cultural content, such interventions threaten to have unintended and unwanted results. It 56 James Cockayne, ‘Hybrids or Mongrels? Internationalized War Crimes Trials as Unsuccessful Degradation Ceremonies,’ Journal 58 Interview with elder, Anaka Camp, 8 August of Human Rights , 4:455-473, 2005, p. 465. 2007. 57 ibid , p. 465 59 (Finnström, 2003, p.13).

13 Field Note 5 is imperative that further justice projects in to inform and improve local, national and the region recognize the complexities of international policies and programmes on local cosmologies of those affected most justice and reconciliation. The JRP field gravely by the conflict: impoverished rural office is hosted by the Gulu District NGO persons who are least likely to be included Forum. at the tables where justice strategies are designed. Where formal justice mechanisms This issue was written by Letha Victor, with have been severely undermined in the rural the assistance of Erin Baines. It was areas by the conflict,, the moral order is that researched by Anyeko Ketty, Sarah Louw, resource upon which everyday people draw and Komakech Emon with the assistance of upon to assert power over their lives. This is Owor Ogora Lino, Ojok Boniface, and the not to say formal justice is not wanted or focal point persons and committees in needed, but that for some, it will not be Amuru, Anaka, Kolongo, Padibe, and Pajule enough. Camps. We are deeply grateful for your time and effort. Thanks also to Michael Otim, This edition of Field Notes asserts that GDNF and Project Coordinator. In cleansing too is a form of reconciliation. It is appreciation to the Catherine T. and John D. reconciliation at the highest level, for it is MacArthur Foundation, and the Royal reconciliation initiated by the powerless to Embassy of the Netherlands. the benefit of all Acholi people, living and dead. As we witnessed in one cleansing ceremony, the elder spoke his agat , or For more information please contact: blessing, and evoked the names of the local ancestors: ‘You are the ones who brought Erin Baines [email protected] us into this world. You gave us life and Boniface Ojok [email protected] above all the rituals to cleanse our people. Today we come before you to do the same www.justiceandreconciliation.com things you used to do when you were in this world. We cleanse your children in your presence as a deed destined to harmonize them with their brothers and sisters in the community. They were captured and forced to kill their own people. They have greatly displeased the spirit world against their own wish and therefore call for cleansing so that they return to normal. So bless and accept our ritual.’ He concluded by saying ‘Poto ceng otee (let every cen go as the sunsets).’ As the crowd pointed to the sunset, they responded, ‘ Otee matwal . Let them go forever.’ 60

Field Notes is a series of reports by the JRP. Each issue features a new theme related to Acholi cultural justice practices based on research carried out with war-affected persons in camps and special justice issues that arise during the course of JRP work. Drawing directly on the experiences and initiative of victims, Field Notes are intended

60 Cleansing ritual witnessed by JRP researcher, Anaka Camp, 18 September 2005.

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