Six years after the guns fell silent, and months into the second iteration of the Peace, Recovery and Development Programme (PRDP), the question of whether northern Uganda is truly at peace remains unanswered in many people’s minds.
An examination of regional and sub-regional conflict drivers by the three members of the Advisory Consortium on Conflict Sensitivity (ACCS) - International Alert, Refugee Law Project, Saferworld - over 2010-2012 aims to provide a comprehensive analysis of conflict drivers that have the potential to undermine development and peacebuilding efforts underway in PRDP II. It focuses on people’s perceptions of whether the PRDPs and associated interventions are increasing the likelihood of long-term peace and stability in the region.
This conflict analysis reveals that many communities in northern Uganda appear to be in a state of latent conflict, with increasingly frequent manifestations of overt conflict including clashes between communities and government officials, violent community disputes over resources, and sexual and gender-based violence. The inadequately addressed legacies of the war with the Lord’s Resistance Army, fuelled by new and long-standing grievances, are keeping communities in a state of unease where trigger events can lead to a rapid escalation of violence. Conflict drivers identified in this analysis (such as land grabbing, corruption, and competition over natural resources) are creating a context that many respondents believe will lead to a return to overt conflict, whether in the form of increasing social unrest or more organised violence.
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