Sorry for the delay in posting for the last few days. I’ve
had some struggles finding power the last week so my writing has become a bit
sporadic. Finally back to normal power
situation here though, well at least for now. Seeing that green light come on
my laptop charger is exciting! Who knew I’d spend my days running around trying
to find a generator so I could charge my life up.
I wish I could say being here I’m not reliant on power and
all that, but unfortunately staying in touch with the outside world and doing
work kind of requires that. So the last week has seen me walking up and down
through town with my laptop in search of power and internet signal.
Unfortunately the two don’t ever seem to come in the same place, but as KDF now
officially has an office space this will hopefully makes things easier.
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| KDF finally has an office & Teba a place to put all his ideas |
The last week has been spent doing a lot of editing and also
thinking a lot about what I want and should write while I’m here. I really want
to write something on the mining sector and the challenges that will come from
the expansion of mining in Karamoja. Although I am realizing it’s a difficult
subject to approach because the two sides of the argument are so far apart, and
I don’t know if I really see them ever coming together. The cultural and
ecological aspect against the pure capitalist, I would say the capitalist will succeed
and those advocating for the preservation of Karamoja will be left to pick up
the pieces once the mining runs its course. A bit of a pessimistic view I know,
but if you look at the facts of what it is happening it is hard not to think
like that. I read the Human Rights Watch report on mining before I came to
Karamoja, and as this report is almost a year old now I would imagine some of
their recommendations would have been implemented already, or that there would
at least be some more talk about the human rights abuses connected to mining.
This is not to say that it is not on the agenda of various NGO’s and government
here, but little is actually being done. The mines that I have seen are exactly
the same as described a year ago and the same issues are there. People are not
being paid enough, and some not even paid at all. The minerals are being
shipped out of Karamoja at a fast pace, perhaps they know the time of
unregulated mining is bound to come to an end at some point. So currently one
of my many projects here is gathering more specific information on mining in
the region, hopefully another trip to the artisanal miners will provide some
more
accurate numbers of prices of gold etc. Another walk with Teba might be
needed.
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| Artisanal gold mining hole, they can be found all along the road |
On a completely different note the more time I spend here
the more I hear of the way Karamoja used to be in the past. The past when
weapons were everywhere, and insecurity followed you to the borders of
Karamoja. Writing my dissertation on the disarmament of Karamoja I approached it
from a cultural aspect that I’m realizing is not too practical in real life. The
majority of my study was a comparative view of Karimojong societies and
Daasanach in Ethiopia. I argued that disarmament or not just disarmament, but
the negative government involvement in Karamoja caused the region to become
unsafe, and that the culture and the strength of traditional society in the
area would have been strong enough to cope with the influx of weapons if the
outside had not interfered too much. I realize as this is a ‘what if’ sort of
scenario it’s hard to say if it could have been possible. The more I’m told
about the years of weapons here though, it seems a great deal of it was just
unorganized violence that took the lives of any civilian caught in the
crossfire. Then again there are the stories of tanks rolling over villages, with
people still in their huts, and the violent cordon and search operations
performed by the military. The disarmament was successful in the end, and I
think overall that is a very positive thing for Karamoja, but I still firmly
believe that the road to disarmament and the human rights abuses perpetrated on
the way were not justified. It has also served to create a great deal of
mistrust, which I think the state of Uganda will take a long time to rectify.
The people here have been through decades of discriminatory policies, and I
hope and believe that the time is here now for Karamoja to become an active
part of Uganda. Karamoja shouldn’t just be known as the insecure region with
development issues, it is so much stronger than that.
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| Disarmed but still fierce in the cultural pride |
So that was my serious thoughts of today. Now I keep getting asked what
I do here every day and during the weekends. So a little recap of my weekend
with some pictures. As I said previously my search for power took up quite a
bit of time the last week, so once I finally found power I would sit for a few
hours writing, researching or editing, depending on the day.
Saturday I went clothes shopping with Karolien. In Moroto
that means digging your way through heaps of used clothes, which seemed to not
be in any particular order, but we did succeed in finding a few things. The
clothes markets always fascinate me here as so much of the clothes that are
sold are clothes people in the ‘West’ give away to charities. So whoever
donated away their nice clothes probably did not expect a Norwegian girl to be
buying them in a market in Moroto. But at the same time it does create a
market, and an economy, which is more ideal than simply giving away things, at
least in my mind. So to whoever owned the nice top I bought for 5000 UGX, you
are now a little part of supporting the economy here.
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| Karolien digging her way to her new outfits |
After shopping we made dinner and decided to head out for a
couple of drinks. We met up with Simon and he ended up taking us to a club in
town to play pool. A bit of a bizarre experience as there were hardly any girls
in the club, but the guys were very friendly and let us play pool with them, I
do believe we did win or almost won one of the times as well. Dj Fresh had the
music going, and yea it was a good night. So life here is not too different
from anywhere else. The power might not be too reliable, but I think I prefer a
night out here than a night out in Oslo.
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| The freshest DJ in Moroto |
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