Richard M. Kavuma
2 July 2002
Members of Parliament from northern Uganda yesterday said that 'Operation Iron Fist' has made the security situation there even worse than before.
The MPs told journalists at Parliament that Joseph Kony's rebels are now freely harassing the people, causing constant displacement from smaller to bigger camps.
Kilak MP Nyeko Michael Ocula said because many of the home guards have been taken to Sudan, the masses in small camps and the countryside are left at the mercy of the rebels.
"This is coming during the growing season, so our people will be in a great crisis in three months," said Aswa MP Okumu Regan.
They said 'Operation Iron Fist' has been a failure, as only two captives - an abandoned child and a boy aged five - have been rescued.
They said LRA rebels recently handed over women and children to religious and local leaders although the army said the captives were abandoned under pressure from the UPDF.
The MPs made an impassioned appeal to President Yoweri Museveni to talk to end the LRA insurgency.
The MPs said that dialogue is the only way out after the on-going 'Operation Iron Fist' to capture Kony has 'failed.'
"The president should swallow his pride and talk to Kony," said Aswa MP Okumu Regan. "Not because Kony is a great man, not because Kony is a fighting for a just cause, but to save the people of Acholi."
Nwoya MP Zachary Olum said even the British and American governments talked to the Irish Republican Army of Northern Ireland, even though they were well-known terrorists.
The MPs appealed to the international community not to rely on government propaganda, but to address the humanitarian crisis in northern Uganda.
"The US government should not allow a whole tribe of Acholi to be sacrificed in the name of fighting terrorism," Okumu said, adding that 'Operation Iron Fist' will leave the people more wounded than before.
"We think there is a terrible miscalculation," Okumu said of the operation. "May be the UPDF will have to go back to the drawing board and reconsider the strategies."
The MPs said they are planning to take Kampala based journalists to northern Uganda to see for themselves and talk to the local population there.
However, UPDF spokesman Maj. Shaban Bantariza told The Monitor that the army is doing all it can to protect the people of northern Uganda.
He said no home guards had been taken to Sudan but they have since been put in mobile units and deployed on the roads.
"The five hundred or so men of Kony are in Kitgumu, Gulu and Pader," Bantariza said. "They are everywhere, which we can't do because we don't deploy fifteen soldiers."
He challenged the MPs to name the leaders who received the captives from Kony.
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