The View from Atiak: Remembering Tragedy, 14 Years Later

This is part of an occasional series with first-hand reports from those working in some of the more difficult corners of the world.

This post is by Jon Marino, writing from northern Uganda. To read Jon's previous posts, see here.

Jon is a Fulbright Scholar who conducts research on conflict and recovery, while also serving as country director of assetmap.org, a new initiative that helps communities use the internet to discover and connect the resources they have for their own development.

The View from Atiak: Remembering tragedy, 14 years later

As I enjoyed an early breakfast of bread and instant coffee last Monday morning, I thought about what the view from this small restaurant in the center of Atiak must have looked like fourteen years ago…

At 5:00 am on April 20, 1995 rebel soldiers from the Lord’s Resistance Army entered this small village located on the road to Juba, about 24 kilometers from the Sudanese border. According to Anguish of Northern Uganda,  a history of the war written by Robert Gersony:

“In the six hours that followed, the LRA maintained unchallenged military control of Atiak. During this period, in the absence of armed opposition, between 170 and 220 unarmed civilians were detained and killed, including the families of the local defense unit, students from Atiak Secondary Technical Institute, and others. Although it is widely believed that the Ugandan army had advance warning of the Atiak attack, the first army units arrived in the late afternoon, following the LRA’s departure."

Every year people gather in Atiak on April 20 to remember the dead and mourn in common. This year’s participants included religious leaders, politicians, school children, visitors, and the vast majority of Atiak’s residents—a crowd of at least 500.

We began the ceremony by marching through the main trading centre to a memorial stone dedicated to those who died. The stone’s epitaph reads, “In loving memory of our sons and daughters massacred in Atiak on April 20, 1995. May their soul rest in eternal peace.”

Circled around the stone, the crowd watched as representatives of various groups laid flowers while saying a word of blessing. Tears clouded the eyes of many as prayers were quietly offered—a Muslim blessing sung in Arabic, a word of regret from a commander of the Uganda People's Defense Force, three school children dressed in uniforms reciting together from memory...

After the last flower was laid, the crowd walked slowly back through town to tents and chairs that filled the courtyard of Olya Primary School. For the next five hours a program of speeches, survivor stories, music and dancing, and lunch ensued. As I observed from the back, I thought about how the gathering seemed to represent a microcosm of northern Uganda in the current moment.

I thought about the progress evident in the day’s event site, Olya Primary School, which once housed as many as five different primary schools that were relocated from more rural areas during the war. Now operating on its own again, Olya still faces many challenges—the most recent of which was a windstorm that blew off the roof of its kitchen.

I thought about the inspiration generated by Sister Rosemary Nyirumbe seated among the religious leaders. Sister Rosemary was named a CNN Hero in 2007 for her work educating formerly abducted girls. She has since used the award money to start a new program based on her model in Atiak. I thought about the frustration caused by politicians as one district leader talked for over an hour about government’s promise to bring money to the community through programs that I knew were currently delayed and quite different in content than he led the crowd to believe.

The conclusion of the local Catholic priest’s speech sent off a thought in my head that I want to conclude with here.

Speaking about the need for reconciliation and healing in the community, Father Arnall said, “Retribution is not good. It is evil. All of Uganda has been martyred. All of Uganda must now be one.”

For some reason, the comment reminded me of a key point made in Drew Gilpin Faust’s Pulitzer Prize nominated history of the American Civil War, The Republic of Suffering.In trying to understand how an America divided by such widespread bloodshed was able to reconcile and recover, Faust realizes that the experience of death similarly felt by northerner and southern provided the common denominator necessary for unity. Faust writes:

“At war's end this shared suffering would override persisting differences about the meanings of race, citizenship, and nationhood to establish sacrifice and its memorialization as the ground on which North and South would ultimately reunite.”

By saying that “All of Uganda has been martyred” and warning against retribution, I think Father Arnall was imploring Ugandans to find the connective power in the shared suffering that has touched every corner of the country.

Ugandans are separated by many things: class, ethnicity, religion, language, political ideology, rural and urban lifestyles, education attainment, British football club preferences, etc. But, they are certainly united by their universal experience of suffering caused by violent conflict. From the skulls of the Luweero Triangle to the Tanzanian military’s march through Masaka to the anguish of northern Uganda, no corner has been left untouched.

The challenge—and the opportunity—for the leaders of this country is to connect the population around their shared suffering and use it as a basis for a new era of unity, peace, and locally owned and operated development.

[Atiak resident mourns those lost in the 1995 massacre - Photo taken by Lauren Parnell Marino]