History of Global Arms Transfer, 6 (2018), pp. 23-37

Ugandan Pastoralists’ Everyday Histories
of Gun Acquisition and State Violence†
By ITSUHIRO HAZAMA*This paper aims to practice history from below concerning the disarmament of
the pastoral communities of north-eastern Uganda, the Karimojong and the
Dodoth. The central government is a major source of so-called illegallytransferred guns for East African pastoralists, and state violence has awoken thememories of local residents in terms of their experiences with violence. In thedisarmament of the twenty-first century, newly purchased guns are being
submitted to the military in order to emancipate captive pastoralists who weretaken to and detained in military barracks. Those who will be exchanged for theseguns are represented by the pastoralists as homologous with nineteenth century
slaves who were caught by outsiders engaged in ivory trade when guns werebrought into the Karamoja region. The ritual healing of violence-related illnesses
requires a shared history of state violence to make people realize that those who
rule always exercise violence against those being ruled and how people have
lived as cultural existence. This past reconstruction is currently present and is aprocess of interweaving personal memories into collective memories. The historyof arms transfer and the state control of north-eastern Ugandan pastoralists is thepast facts selected trough problem consciousness directed at external violent rule.
It is also a composition of facts and current history in the sense of Croce’s
historical thought and is a history lived with the body.
In East African pastoral societies, automatic rifles have been abundant since the 1980s.
Political scientists and anthropologists have sounded an alarm bell that pastoralists’survival is being threatened by inter-group armed violence over livestock. According theirarguments, arms transfer control can only be accomplished effectively by disarmament
conducted by the state and international society.1
In Karamoja (Figure 1) in north-eastern Uganda, when the collapse of the Ugandan
government under Idi Amin Dada Oumee’s (1925–2003) military dictatorship resulted in
an inflow of automatic rifles to the region in 1979–80, cattle-raiding by using automatic
rifles have become a daily occurrence.2 The central government, which is backed by the* Author’s affiliation: Associate Professor, School of Global Humanities and Social Sciences, Nagasaki
University; Graduate School of Global Humanities and Social Sciences, Nagasaki University.
† Acknowledgements: A previous version of this article was presented at ‘Relationships between arms
availability and violence’ organized by the Meiji University Research Institute for the History of Global Arms
Transfer on 28 March 2018. The author would like to thank Tomoji Onozuka, Nicholas Marsh, Toru Sagawa,Tamara Enomoto, and Katsuhiko Yokoi for their extensive advice and comments. This work was supported by
the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology’s Program for the Strategic Research
Foundation at Private Universities, 2015–19, JSPS KAKENHI grant numbers JP16K17075, JP16KT0040,
JP22710253, and JP16H05664.
1 Gray et al., ‘Cattle raiding’; Schlee, ‘Comment’.
2 Many raids are carried out against people belonging to other ethnic or territorial groups. However, raiding

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ITSUHIRO HAZAMA
United Kingdom and the United States, has been implementing a disarmament policy thatwas praised by the Ugandan government as being the most consistent and longest in
Ugandan history since 2000.3 While achievements in terms of arms control are emphasizedin history by the state, they have also led to complex arms transfer and armed conflicts,
including violent confrontations between the national army and local pastoralists andfrequent raids provoked by disparities of arms. As a result, coping practices for illnesses
caused by political and physical violence have been developed.

Figure 1. Map of the research area.

Figure 1. Map of the Research Area
Source: Author.

Source: Author.

This paper describes and analyses an everyday history from below4 of gun acquisitionand complex violence under the hegemony of disarmament based on explicit endeavours inorder to attend to the voices of pastoralists who have been marginalized and to explain theireveryday experiences to those of people with dominant force. It will note the pastoralists’creativity in the face of the difficulty in surviving and elucidate on the culture of resistancebeing formed against the self-contained culture of violence. Resistance, in this case, will
not remain at the level of resistant violence against dominant violence, which is obviously
within one ethnic group and territorial group is not unusual.
3 Hazama, ‘Intergroup’.
4 Rosaldo, ‘Celebrating’.

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Ugandan Pastoralists’ Everyday Histories of Gun Acquisition and State Violence
futile in front of large scale and systematic violence of the dominant power. This paper
grasps the possibility that pastoralists who are structurally in the lowest social stratum are
actually able to domesticate unreasonable violence and alter the modern violence systemby means of sustaining everyday life.
Field research has been conducted in Karimojong society since 1998 and in Dodoth
society since 2002. They are the semi-nomadic pastoralists in the Karamoja region, thesemi-arid savannah of north-eastern Uganda bordering Kenya and South Sudan. The
Karimojong and the Dodoth engage in cattle-, goat-, and sheep-based pastoralism, speak acommon Eastern Nilotic language, sometimes practice inter-marriage, and sometimes share
pasture land.

I
Two historical events caused the inflow of guns into the Karamoja region. This gun
acquisition is remembered in current local gun designations and transactions.
Eastern Nilotes living on the borders between Kenya, Uganda, Sudan, and Ethiopia, suchas the Karimojong, the Dodoth, the Jie, the Toposa, the Turkana, and the Nyangatom, use
the word ngatomyan (s. atom) to describe guns. The word ngatomyan relates to the word
for elephant (etom). The word calls to mind the earliest influx of rifles in the nineteenth
century when Ethiopians, British people, North Americans, Arabs, and Swahili people
supplied rifles to Eastern Nilotic pastoralists as payment for ivory and as tools for hunting
elephants. The Karimojong-speaking cluster of the Eastern Nilotes (Ateker) firstencountered gunrunners operating in the Maji border area of south-west Ethiopia.5 Thus,
firearms were first introduced into the Karamoja region to secure ivory as a commodity.
After Uganda became a British protectorate in 1894, the Karamoja region was excluded
from British rule for 17 years because its semi-arid land was seen as unsuitable for the
production of the cash crops that were in high demand in Britain, such as cotton and coffee.
However, elephants were numerous in the area, and ivory traders were attracted to thisunexplored commodity. Local inhabitants joined traders in ivory hunting and received
livestock as a reward. As the number of elephants decreased throughout the world and theprices of ivory climbed, competition between traders became intense.6 It was at this pointthat traders gave pastoralists in the Karamoja region guns to hunt for ivory or as a reward,
replacing livestock as payment for hunting.
It is this time in the beginning of twenty century that ivory traders appeared as gun
suppliers for the first time in administrative records. The traders included Arabs, British
people, North Americans, Greeks, Ethiopians, and slaves from the Swahili coast. In the
1910s, rifles were supplied as tools or rewards; traders initially exchanged modern firearms
for ivory and slaves both before and after the Karamoja region came under colonial rule.7
Today, the Karimojong and the Dodoth must frequently release their friends and relatives
who were caught by the army from detention huts in army barracks; this is referred to as
the emancipation (alakakin) of a slave or a porter (ekadalan). Bringing back a captive
involves the transfer of automatic rifles and livestock; this is described in more detail in
Section V.
Estimating the total number of guns in the Karamoja region is difficult due to the lack of
5 Mburu, ‘Delimitation’.
6 Mamdani et al., Karamoja.
7 Barber, ‘Karamoja in 1910’; Welch, ‘Pastoralists’.

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ITSUHIRO HAZAMA
records, but Mamdani et al. reported that, at the beginning of the twentieth century, guns
entered northern Uganda from the Karamoja region.8 They based this assertion on a report
written by a district officer that stated that, when two chiefs from the Acholi explored thearea, including Kotido, Kaabong, and Moroto, by the order of the colonial government,
they acquired 1,200 rifles from traders who worked primarily in the Karamoja region. In
1931, the population of the Karamoja region was estimated to be 65,000.9 It is almost
certain that the population was smaller in the 1910s than in the 1930s. Thus, in the 1910s,
pastoral societies, including the Karimojong and the Dodoth, had at least one gun for every
54 people.
In 1979, the regime of Idi Amin was overthrown. In the same year, the Matheniko, one of
the three main territorial groups of the Karimojong, raided Idi Amin’s armoury in Moroto,
the capital of the district. The Moroto army barracks had been abandoned, and the
Karimojong took advantage of the situation to acquire guns from the deserted armoury. The
number of guns taken was sufficient for the needs of the group, with a surplus left over for
trade with neighbouring ethnic groups. 10 Quam estimated that 10,000 guns went into
circulation at the time.11 Sylvester and Jeremy estimated that, in addition to the 10,000
guns, two million rounds of ammunition were transported at the time,12 and Odhiambo
cited 12,000 guns in accordance with an estimation by Wangoola.13 An elder Karimojong
from Lotome, in 2003, recalled in conversation with author (Hazama) that people hadtransported guns in bundles on the backs of donkeys and that they had reminded him ofbundles of firewood. According to the event calendar, a list of historical events sharedorally to indicate certain years, 1979 was ‘the year the Matheniko broke into army barracks
for guns’ (ekaru ngolo abwangunita Ngimatheniko ngatomian).
It is highly probable that not only guns but also bullets had been exchanged much more
frequently than guns for various daily necessities; this remains true today. For example, in
2003, an AK-47 bullet sold for 500 UGX in Kaabong. At the time, this is equivalent to theprice of two litres of local brew made from maize or millet, which can be acquired in
exchange for bullets. In these transactions, brew purchasers are usually soldiers dispatchedto the Karamoja region; when their salaries were delayed, they use bullets in place of cash
to buy brew from women in pastoral society. The soldiers have been spread all over the
Karamoja region since implementation of disarmament, and women store crops, money,
and bullets in food granaries.
The commodification of arms dates back to the beginning of colonisation, and arms havebecome a part of everyday life for pastoralists, not only as tools of protection andaggression but also as a transaction method.

II
In 1980 in the Karamoja region, the transition from traditional guns to modern guns was
accomplished. This was a considerably earlier inflow compared to that experienced by thegeneral citizens of Sudan and Kenya. The Boran and the Gabra, pastoralists in northern
Kenya and south-western Ethiopia, respectively, acquired AK-47s in 1991 from members
8 Mamdani et al., Karamoja.
9 Langlands, ‘The population’.
10 Mamdani et al., Karamoja.
11 Quam, ‘Creating peace’.
12 Sylvester and Jeremy, Karamoja, Uganda’s land.
13 Odhiambo, The Karamoja conflict; Wangoola, ‘Cattle rustling’.

26

Ugandan Pastoralists’ Everyday Histories of Gun Acquisition and State Violenceof the Ethiopian government military who fled southward into Kenya after the fall of the
Derg government to Tigrean insurgents.14 The Sudanese army began supplying northern
Baggara groups with AK-47s and bullets in 1986, encouraging them to raid the Nuer andthe Dinka located in the Western Upper Nile and northern Bahr el Ghazal.15
When modern European guns capable of continuous fire, including AK-47s and G3s,
were brought into the Karamoja region after 1980, they completely dominated gun trade in
the Karamoja region and replaced traditional match-lock guns. As a result, automatic rifles
now account for 90 per cent of the guns owned by pastoralists today. By 1998, 64 per centof Karimojong men whose semi-permanent settlement was Lotome and who were over 18
years of age owned a gun (n = 123), and, in 2003, 90 per cent of Dodoth men over 18 yearsof age whose semi-permanent settlement was Kalapata (n = 30) owned a gun.
In July 2008, I studied approximately 214 rifles owned by the Karimojong in Bokora
County in the Moroto District.16 Of these, 89.7 per cent were semi-automatic rifles. The
rifles owned by the Karimojong can be classified into the eight categories listed below.
1) In total, 65 AK-47s or copies of AK-47s were found. Locally, the AK-47 is called
Amakana, and it occurs in ten versions: Aceger, Akeju-asuulu (or Akeju-batat), Asili-reng,Apas, Ameri-keju, Ayesengor, Nakasongola, Atodobokakilegit (or Aritongit), Akwapenek,
and Ariamakor. Both Atodobokakilengit and Akwapenek can be fitted with a fixed bayonet(ekileng). The sight of Atodobokakilegit is ring shaped (todo means a round horn shape of
cattle), and its wooden gunstock is dark (bok). Although it is very popular because it lasts
well and has little kickback, Nakasongola, a word that originates from the name of a
district in central Uganda in which the gun is manufactured, is an inferior product thatmelts at the neck after repeated firing. Apas, which is a silver-white iron (apas), is made in
Yugoslavia.
2) The G3 is called Aliba. In total, 44 G3s were found. Aliba refers to a small green
weaverbird. Germany, France, and Israel were identified as the countries that produce thisgun, and Kenyan police often use G3s.
3) There are two types of light machine guns: Acoronga and Narikot. In total, 35 lightmachine guns were found. People say that Narikot ‘drinks’ a chain (erikot) of bullets at one
time. Acoronga has a tripod (awed) that looks like a chicken’s foot.
4) The self-loading rifle is called Epian, which sounds like the word for thunder(ngipian). In total, 31 self-loading rifles, divided into five types, were found: Locicuwa,
Lokirion, Nato, Akosowan, and Elekejen. Locicuwa has a split on the side of the barrel near
the front so that bullets can be seen as they are fired. Lokirion has a black body and a long,quadratic barrel.
5) A self-match-lock gun called Amatida was the oldest one found. In total, 22 were
found. Amatida is a handmade gun made of iron pipes, such as water pipes. There aretypes: abicir and logelegel. Both are shotguns that use gunpowder. They are stuffed andthen ignited by friction. The cartridge case is removed by a single shot. The older of thetwo, lolegel, has no sight.
6) The assault self-loading rifle (ASLR) is called Apeledeng. The ASLR is divided into
four types: Achinese, Agurigur, Agorogoro, and Aparipar. In total, ten ASLRs were found.
Achainis is used by the Uganda People’s Defence Force when they march in ceremonies.
Aguriguri is powerful enough to shoot helicopters in the air. Agorogoro is an old type of
14 Galaty, ‘Boundary-making’.
15 Hutchinson, ‘Nuer ethnicity’.
16 Administratively, the district was reorganized along with the creation of the Napak District adjacent tosouthwestern Moroto in 2010. Then, Bokora County was incorporated into the Napak District.

27

ITSUHIRO HAZAMA
gun, and it makes a particular sound, like ‘gorogoro’, as empty cartridges are removed one
by one during shooting.
7) The Uzi gun is called Eitabui. Six Uzis were found, divided into two types: Achacha
and Loringiring. The Uzi is a compact, boxy, and lightweight sub-machine gun. Eitabui
originally referred to a square, three-litre can of oil that was distributed as aid supply
during a period of starvation in 1980.
8) The G2 is called Eleponbong. Five G2s were found. This gun has a stand and a square‘cup’. The stem of the word Eleponbong (lep) comes from akilep, which means to milk,
and the gun is said to run bullets as smoothly as milk coming from the teat of a cow.
Data on the types of guns and the years of their acquisition showed that, first, before
1979, gun transactions were recorded less than once every two years, but, from 1980
Figure1. Maptransactionsof the researchtook
area.place every year. Second, the AK-47, which was developed byonwards,
MichaelKalashnikov and adopted by Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in 1947, were
Source:Author.
acquired by the Karimojong in 1980. Third, when the history of gun transactions is divided
into before 1979 and after 1980, the average number of guns acquired per year increased
more than tenfold, from 0.6 per year before 1979 to 6.5 per year after 1980 (Figure 2).17

Figure 2. Types of guns acquired before 1979 and after 1980
Figure 2. Types of guns acquired before 1979 and after 1980.
Source: Author.

Source: Author.

Thus, the increases in AK-47s and G3s demonstrate that guns taken from the centre of the
Karamoja region in raids spread across the area. It can be said empirically that the influx ofrifles began in the late nineteenth century along with the ivory trade brought in byoutsiders, whereas the proliferation of automatic rifles, especially AK-47s and G3s, began
in 1980 in the Karamoja region.
Although the guns used before automatic rifles became widespread were used even in the
17 When the Karamojong and the Dodoth express a certain past, they refer to events that their conversational
partners can understand, such as ‘when a comet flows’ and ‘when a drought happens’. In popular memories,
drought, conflict, livestock disease, and hunger play key roles. See Appendices 1 and 2.

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Ugandan Pastoralists’ Everyday Histories of Gun Acquisition and State Violence
2000s, the low frequency of their transaction before 1979 may reflect that they became
unnecessary due to the proliferation of new guns or the malfunctioning of old guns. The
reason people have guns is usually to safeguard their families and herds from attacks. If theincrease in the frequency of transactions after the inflow of automatic rifles reflects, tosome extent, the reality of gun transaction, it is expected that the necessity of defence
increased. A 12-year-old Karimojong shepherd composed and sang the following song in2003 to describe the feeling of being protected by his elder brother’s gun during herding:
Go to graze in Lomuriakori.
There is a gun of Lokiru always.
Go to graze in Lomuriakori.
There is a gun of Lokiru.
Go to graze in Lomuriakori.
The yellow one [ox] is becoming fat.
There is a gun of Lokiru always.
Lomuriakori is the name of place where cattle grazes, especially in dry seasons, and interethnic raids usually revolve around livestock. The song is inspired by the potential battle
field in which the elder brother’s gun can protect the ‘yellow ox’, as contemporary pastoral
scenery involves both guns and cattle in order to protect the herd and allow the family tosurvive.

III
Although successive political powers have engaged in disarming pastoralists in the
Karamoja region since 1980, the army of the central government has played contradictoryroles, first removing guns and then providing them during violent political conflicts. For
example, as a countermeasure against anti-government forces, guns were provided topastoralists by the government because the local people were considered a militarycapability that would favour the government.18 With a change in political power, fleeing
soldiers deployed in Karamoja region exchanged their guns for food provided by the local
people.
This contradictory structure of disarmament by the government is not a holdover from the
distant past. In 1999 and 2005, I conducted research on how the 34 guns owned by men in
Lotome were acquired. The research revealed that the number of guns given to people whoserved as local security19 was less than the number of guns bartered for livestock from anarms merchant (10 of the 34 guns). These guns were distributed as a substitute salary, thepayment of which had been delayed, and as a means of self-defence for special forces, suchas the Anti Stock Theft Unit and the Local Defence Unit.
Disarmament is not an apolitical process. The changing tolerance for transferring arms toconvenient actors based on the intentions of the dominant power resulted in the paradoxthat has enabled and even encouraged people who do not have guns to acquire them.
The disarmament of automatic rifles in the Karamoja region has been attempted bysuccessive governments since it was first implemented 1983–5 by the government led by
18 For example, during the second period of Obote’s rule (1980–85), pastoralists in Karamoja were recruited as
military forces to suppress anti-government activity by the National Resistance Army.
19 The military organisation was formed as a part of the disarmament policy, which people can join bysubmitting illegal guns to the government.

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ITSUHIRO HAZAMA
Apollo Milton Opeto Obote (1924–2005). The government has a formal written history
regarding the military intervention in the Karamoja region and notes that it was a legitimate
pacifying action, assuming that physical violence was performed by pastoralists using
illegally acquired weapons. 20 However, in the everyday history of pastoral people,
disarmament, called akilem ngatomyen (to pick guns) in the Karimojong and Dodoth
languages, is remembered as a conflict with the state that also involved raids between
neighbouring pastoralist groups.
The first example of disarmament of automatic rifles occurred between 1983 and 1984,
after Obote borrowed an armed helicopter from the Kenyan government, utilizing themilitia established in the district bordering neighbouring countries. In December 1983, thearmy bombed villages and shopping centres in Matany and Kangole, both of which belong
to the Napak District today. In the Government report, these operations are stated to havebeen punishments for resistance to disarmament.21 From the perspective of the Karimojong,these operations were more of a revenge by the state as theft. They began looting cattle tobe eaten by Christian soldiers in celebration of Christmas. A middle-aged Karimojong man
based in Kangole narrated a story like the one below:
Militia from Langoland came in a very large number of heavy-duty trucks for the
purpose of getting ‘Christmas cow’ and attacked in Lokwasonyong in Matany. Anothermilitia group also arrived in Kangole but did not know where to go, asked questions
and got answers from people, and then moved to Matany. Soon, the explosion began
to come from the direction of Matany. The battle began at the herding camp in Matany.
The Karimojong opposes the militia. Battle started from two p.m. to three p.m.
Militias were brought back eastward to Moroto, where the main troops settled. On theway, a fierce battle occurred between the Karimojong and the militia. When they
arrived in Kangole, they began to rage and bombard the houses indiscriminately. It
continued without interruption until dawn, and the shooting fight never ceased. The
battle was severe, but the Karimojong forced the militia to give in, and militia began
to escape into Moroto. Soon, the army soldiers stationed in Moroto and the militia
came to support Lango militia. The soldier kept killing people and continuing to blow
up. But they were rebuked, lost the direction, and dispersed. Some returned to Soroti;
others ran away to Moroto. I was eight years old then. I was with my parents in asemi-permanent settlement in Kangole. During the bombing, we were forced to run.
We ran to the church and evacuated because we knew they would not bomb the
church. So, I led an evacuation life with a lot of people for a week.
The second example involves the implementation of a security maintenance plan from
1983–5, which is called ‘the year of stealing’ in the event calendar of the Karimojong. In
this period, military personnel fired at and bombed pastoralists, confiscated their livestock,and murdered locals rampantly, resulting in physical conflicts due to local civilian
resistance. In addition, the ‘Pian people [one of major territorial groups of the Karimojong][had] nowhere to go’. About seventy per cent of the population of southern Karamoja wasforced to relocate.22 This estimate supports the narratives of the Karimojong concerningstate violence.
The third example of the disarmament of the Karimojong occurred during ‘the year
20 Office of the Prime Minister, Karamoja integrated.
21 Ibid.
22 Dodge, ‘Uganda-rehabilitation’.

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Ugandan Pastoralists’ Everyday Histories of Gun Acquisition and State Violencepeople were tied with rope’. It was led by Yoweri Kaguta Museveni, the current president,
in 1986. In this case, it is said that the ‘Kadonya method’, which involved violence aimed
to force people to abandon their guns, was implemented. Although the original meaning of
Kadonya is unknown, Karimojong men talked the following: ‘Museveni’s soldiers came topick our guns. Those who had refused the submission of guns were hung on trees and poles
with the knees and elbows tied together’. From this explanation, it seems that impersonal
torture was being carried out as a warning to others or as corporal punishment.

IV
The contradictions pertaining to disarmament and violence are not simply memories of the
distant past. They affect the everyday lives of people in the Karamoja region, which is now
under today’s disarmament intervention; thus, these memories are being physically andsocially updated and revived.
Military operations designed to confiscate guns in the Karamoja region begin byobtaining secret information. One or two intelligence officers are posted in a barrack tofacilitate the process. In the Moroto District, at least 25 barracks, including detachment,
brigade, and divisional barracks, were counted in 2008. Each holds 50–100 battalions. In
actual operation, armies in charge of the area come from barracks and surround a village,
usually in the early morning, to capture suspected gun owners and to determine probablegun owners. Residents are forced out of the settlement and divided into two lines according
to gender, and the males are physically searched. Meanwhile, inside the village, the soldiers
go door to door searching for guns and other items, such as bullets, military uniforms, andsoldiers’ caps. If any of these items are found, their owners are either taken to the army
barracks or questioned. Any man who is taken to the army barracks and might face a court
martial.
Former captives claimed to have experienced torture at the army base; soldiers were said
to have beaten them with sticks, forced them into small, low-roofed huts (ejaa) where they
could only kneel, forced them to perform heavy labour, and only allowed them to have one
or two bathing per week. For example, a Karimojong man was captured and held in thebarracks of Lotome in the Moroto District three times for a total of 16 days since November
2007. According to his reports, the daily schedule for those who were captured was asfollows: wake at 7 a.m., perform labour from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. with one toilet break at 10a.m., eat at 1 p.m., perform labour immediately after eating until 4 p.m., and receive abeating at 4 p.m. His labour consisted of carrying stones to construct the commander’s hut,fetching water, gathering firewood, gathering grass for the hut’s roof, and mowing grass
inside the army compound.
It is not uncommon for a suspect who is charged with gun possession or raiding and taken
to a detention hut in the army barracks to make a false confession of possessing a gun
during interrogations accompanied by torture. Once a confession is made, the interrogation
is over. From then on, interrogations accompanied by torture are held until a gun issubmitted.
Given the torture, the relatives and friends of the captive generally attempt to free him.
Among the Dodoth, three methods were used to free a captive in 2007: (1) obtain verbal
evidence from administrative leaders and military officials (eight cases), (2) submit a gun
possessed by a relative or friend (nine cases), or (3) submit a newly purchased gun (16cases). Bringing back a captive is often expressed as the emancipation (alakakin) of a slave

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ITSUHIRO HAZAMA
or a porter (ekadalan). In the Karamoja region, during times of ivory hunting and tradearound 1911, men were provided as a labour force for traders23 and as a labour force forcargo carriers.24 These workers were slaves to be mentioned as homologous with captives
under disarmament in 21st century.
When the disarmament programme currently in progress resorts to force, the people are
terrified, and the friends and family of captives struggle to achieve the freedom of thecaptives. Among other strategies, a common way to negotiate a captive’s freedom involves
submitting newly purchased guns or guns owned by other people. It may seem that such abehaviour satisfies the purpose of removing guns from local ownership in north-eastern
Uganda; however, although guns are given to the army in exchange for captives, the reality
is that the demand for guns is stimulated by the desire to obtain guns in order to barter for
captives’ freedom.
[Case 1]In September 2007, a Dodoth man (X) in Kalapata did not possess his own gun. X wastaken as a rebel against the military, as X kept his military cap. An elder brother of X
purchased a gun from a Dodoth man (Y) with two young bulls and put this gun in the
mayor’s hand. The mayor submitted it to the army commander, and X was released.
Y is a herd owner, a livestock trader, and a gun handler. In the period of disarmament,
and especially after the policy of forced sedentarisation established in 2007, gun supply
decreased due to the strengthened crackdown on guns. The exchange rate rose to ten to
twenty cattle per AK-47. However, the number of cattle Y received was variable from two
to ten heads. This means that, while Y received a large number of cattle from the owner, hesells guns at a fixed exchange rate of one gun to two cattle when clients are hoping to freea captive.
Apart from the market rate, the Dodoth have an exchange rate for cattle at the village
level. The standard price in the village is strongly fixed. Guns to free captives are also
included in this exchange system. If market principles are brought into livestock exchanges
between the Dodoth, the person who holds the exchange cannot help but respond to
disadvantageous transactions; thus, locally fixed exchange rates work to prevent them.
Regarding those who bought guns with a small number of cattle, Y said, ‘they wererobbed of cattle and humans by “enemies” (or army), and they fell into ruin. The village isdifferent from the market. This is same to the case that number of cattle is small in case ofbridewealth paid by a poor family’. It is emphasized here that the non-market principle
works in terms of establishing exchanges. In the exchange of guns and cattle for villagers
who have fallen into difficulties, the soaring yet floating exchange rate, which is the resultof supply and demand, cannot be used. This transaction is executed within the frameworkof mutual aid using the fixed exchange rate set by the commune. For the Dodoth, the23 Ngitome, one of the Karamojong territorial groups, literally means ‘elephant people’. The elder who lives inthe village nearest to the centre of their hometown, Lotome, said, ‘The beginning of the cattle of Lotome is ivory.
The ivory was brought to Baringo in Kenya, where people received cattle. Ivory was taken from Baringo to Addis
Ababa. Ivory was brought, and cattle were driven by ekadalan. The meaning of the name of Lotome is “the place
to hunt ivory”’.
24 Lopuko was made a chief in Bokora by Captain Tufnell, who was appointed Touring Officer for the Rudolpharea, which included Karamoja in 1911. Berber noted, in 1962, that ‘[t]he chiefs were expected to keep theirpeople in order, and to provide porters and food when called upon to do so. … While the traders had raided andtaken slaves, they had brought cattle, but government seemed to offer nothing but hard work for little reward’.
See Barber, ‘The Kalamoja’.

32Ugandan Pastoralists’ Everyday Histories of Gun Acquisition and State Violencetransaction of acquiring a gun to free a human captive is different from a market exchange.

V
The Karimojong and the Dodoth have similar past and present positions in terms of theviolence they have experienced in the region, and these positions and superimposing
between past and present have become a resource to safeguard people’s daily lives.
Individual and collective memories of history and oralities play a decisive role in allowing
people to cope with illnesses caused by violence.
Disarmament, including state violence, caused a gap between people who had automaticguns and people who did not and resulted in further armed violence and raiding between
neighbouring groups. Violence-related illnesses occurred in the prolonged low-intensity
conflict, and people faced the problem of how best to heal the bodies.
One way was to construct a healing place to recall the history of state violence. Consider
an illness called etukuri as an example. Etukuri is a type of ‘heart illness’ (etau) caused bya continuous gunshot ‘entering the heart’, an armed helicopter’s flying sound, or the shockcaused by the sound of a rocket gun. In hearing gunshots and explosions and recalling
battles and torture, those suffering from etukuri have acute episodes of feeling as though
their heart and blood vessels are jumping with their heartbeat and experience chest pain,
difficulty breathing, fainting, and confusion. People living with etukuri experience
traumatic events through their bodies.
Historicising violence and state plays critical role in sustaining everyday life of
pastoralists. In ritual healing, participants sing songs to compare the violent events theyexperienced with the state violence that people in the past experienced. Songs of medicine
in ritual healing refer to history (ngakiro nguna etakanuniyete, literally, ‘events that
happened’).
In January 2013, after being taken to the army barracks and tortured for giving incorrect
information, a Dodoth man fell into madness. Songs of medicine reminded him of theviolence of the colonial government, for example, the burning of the house of a Dodoth
man who fought with the current government as a militia of the former government in1988, armed helicopter bombings in 2007, and Jie and Dodoth women collectively
throwing themselves into a muddy stream to protest against being prohibited from wearing
the traditional clothing of pastoralists and made naked by the colonial government in the
1950s and Idi Amin’s government in 1971.
Shared histories never repeat static images. One male participant of the Dodoth while
singing these songs of medicine said, ‘talking about living with each other among
overwhelming violence makes one forget to kill oneself’. Songs of medicine in ritual
healing allow people to realize that everyday life continues even after those who rule
exercise violence against those being ruled. The present is a reconstruction of the past thatinvolves interweaving personal memories into collective memories. To this extent, historyis current, productive, and creative.

VI
Successive central governments with violent military systems play contradictory roles indisarming the Karimojong and the Dodoth and then providing them with guns when violent
political conflicts occur. In the disarmament of the twenty-first century, this contradiction

33

ITSUHIRO HAZAMA
is not a holdover from the distant past. Newly purchased guns have been submitted to themilitary in order to emancipate captives who were pastoralists taken to and detained inmilitary barracks. Those who were exchanged for guns are found its similarity withnineteenth-century slaves who were caught by outsiders when guns were brought into the
Karamoja region. In superimposing memories in healing practices, the collective
remembering of past state violence is carried out through the body of the person
experiencing violence-related illness. The history of arms transfer and the state control ofnorth-eastern Ugandan pastoralists is the past fact selected by problem consciousness
directed at external violent rule. The history of gun availability is a composition of facts,
and current history in the sense of Croce’s historical thought is lived through the body. The
everyday lives of the Karimojong and the Dodoth involve the accumulation of certain
practices, and history only depicts popular lifestyles. The entanglement of individual
entities becomes the foundation for cultures of resistance that overturn regimes present in
the modern violence system, enabling the identification of the existing consequences of
prolonged violence and the sharing of existing knowledge and new strategies for changing
armed violent regime. People affected by violence not only wish to talk about it but also
want to look for ways to break the social chain of violence and for new possibilities foralternative order. Detailing how resistance to violent dominant power is specificallyorganized by the weak in their daily life is the next task.
References
Barber, J. P., ‘The Karamoja district of Uganda’, Journal of African History, 3:1 (1962), pp. 111–24.
Barber, J. P., ‘Karamoja in 1910’, Uganda Journal, 28:1 (1964), pp. 15–23.
Dodge, C. P., ‘Uganda-rehabilitation, or redefinition of health services?’, Social Science and Medicine,
22:7 (1986), pp. 755–61.
Galaty, J., ‘Boundary-making and pastoral conflict along the Kenyan-Ethiopian borderlands’, African
Studies Review, 59:1 (2016), pp. 97–122.
Gray, S., Sundal, M., Weibusch, B., Little, M., Leslie, P., and Pike, I., ‘Cattle raiding, cultural survival, andadaptability of East African pastoralists’, Current Anthropology, 44 (2003), pp. 3–30.
Hazama, I., ‘Intergroup and face-to-face relations among East African herders’, in V. Y. Mudimbe and A.
Simpson, eds., Recontextualizing self & other issues in Africa (Trenton, 2013), pp. 35–52.
Hutchinson, S. E., ‘Nuer ethnicity militarized’, Anthropology Today, 16:3 (2000), pp. 6–13.
Langlands, B. W., ‘The population geography of Karamoja district’, Occasional Paper, 38, Department ofGeography, Makerere University (1971).
Mamdani, M., Kasoma, P. M. B., and Katende, A. B., Karamoja: ecology and history (Kampala, 1992).
Mburu, N., ‘Delimitation of the elastic Ilemi Triangle: pastoral conflicts and official indifference in thehorn of Africa’, African Studies Quarterly, 7:1 (2003), pp. 15–37.
Odhiambo, M., The Karamoja conflict: origins, impacts and solutions (Nairobi, 2003).
Office of the Prime Minister, Karamoja integrated disarmament and development programme: creating
conditions for promoting human security and recovery in Karamoja, 2007/2008-2009/2010 (Kampala,2007).
Quam, M. D., ‘Creating peace in an armed society: Karamoja, Uganda, 1996’, African Studies Quarterly,
1:1 (1997), pp. 33–46.
Rosaldo, R., ‘Celebrating Thompson’s heroes: social analysis in history and anthropology’, in H. J. Kayeand K. McClelland, eds., E. P. Thompson: critical perspectives (Cambridge, 1990), pp. 103-24
Schlee, G., ‘Comment on Sandra Gray et al.: cattle raiding, cultural survival, and adaptability of East
African pastoralists’, Current Anthropology, 44 (2003), pp. 23–4.
Sylvester, O., and Jeremy, O., Karamoja, Uganda’s land of warrior nomads (Stäfa, 2007).
Wangoola, P., ‘Cattle rustling and conflicts in N.E. Uganda: views and perspectives reported by Ugandan
papers, 1989-1999’, A paper presented at the Brainstorming Workshop on Cattle Rustling and Conflictsin North Eastern Uganda, Yiga Ngokola Folk Institute, 25–8 October 1999, p. 4.
Welch, C. P., ‘Pastoralists and administrators in conflict: a study of Karamoja district, 1897-1968’ (unpub.

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Ugandan Pastoralists’ Everyday Histories of Gun Acquisition and State Violence
M.A. thesis, Univ. of East Africa, 1969).
Appendix 1. Karamojong Event Calendar
1914
ekaru a Ngalebei [the year of women workers]
1920
Nasogolo a Lakalees [Nasogolo and Lakaleese]1923
ekaru ngolo arere a Toto Kobok Achia [the year Toto Kobok Achia was killed]
1926
ekaru a lomee [the year of goats]ekaru ngolo awaria akolong [the year the sun became dark]
1927
emorimor [continuous rainfall]
1928
ekaru a lobil a ngitomei [the year of the disease of elephants]
ekaru a ngimongo [the year of the fruits of Balanites]
1933
ekaru ngolo emarere ngitunga [the year they counted people]
1939
ekaru a lokwakoit [the year of white bones]
1941
ekaru ngolo abokeke ngataparin [the year they dug dams]
1943
ekaru ngolo ke euga a Lote [the year of the food relief of Lote]1945
lorengelaga [red necklace]1946
lotekonyen [eyes]
Ngaduruko [the last women’s initiations]1952
lotiira [the star of hunger]
1953
ekaru ngolo arere ngiruwosi [the year chiefs were killed]
1954
ekaru ngolo a longeu [the year of fulfilled granaries]
1956
Apule
1958
asapan a Ngigetei [the initiation of Ngigetei]
1960
ekaru ngolo emeleku ka ngakan [the year of the hoe of hands]
1961
locuu [starvation]
lolibakipi [green water]
1962
ekaru kobote [the year of Obote]mukuki [the year of spears]
ekaru a Namongo [the year of Namongo]
1963
ekaru ngolo a nagilgil [the year of the helicopter]1965
ekaru ngolo lomoroko [the year of the comet]
1966
ekaru adwarakile [the year of bitter milk]
1966–67 ekaru ngolo acakinori agilgil Kwarikwar [the year a helicopter landed in Kwarikwar]
1967
ekaru ngolo keetom [the year of the elephant]
Cepsekunya
1968
ekaru ngolo lopetun [the year of widespread]1969
ekaru ngolo emarere ngitunga [the year they counted people]
1971
ekaru ngolo alaca Amin ngitunga [the year Amin undressed people]
1973
ekaru ngolo atwana akolong [the year the sun died]1974
ekaru ngolo angolia Apalosiel ngitunga [the year Apa-Losiel killed people]
1979
ekaru ngolo eritare Amin [the year Amin was chased away]
ekaru ngolo abwangunita Ngimatheniko ngatomian [the year the Matheniko broke into army
barracks for guns]
1980
ekaru ngolo ka akoro [the year of hunger]ekaru ngolo kebuta [the year of smut]
ekaru ngolo a ngikolya [the year of fish]
1982
ekaru ngolo arere Apa-Loris [the year of Apa-Loris]
1983
ekaru ngolo ecunya arieng Matany ka Kangole [the year the army burnt Matany and Kangole]
1984
ekaru ngolo amica [the year of the army]
ekaru a akooko [the year of theft]
1985
ekaru ngolo Nakichumet [the year of Nakichumet]
1986
ekaru ngolo ekamaria Museveni apukan [the year Museveni came into government]
ekaru ngolo ayenere ngitunga angamuguwae [the year people were tied with rope]
lorionokoriot [black ground]1987
ekaru ngolo kemogo [the year of cassava]
1988
ekaru ngolo amunyarere Ngimatheniko alo Matakul [the year the Matheniko were killed in

35

ITSUHIRO HAZAMA
Matakul]1989
Arusi [RC]1990
ekaru ngolo ka awi ka Alinga [the year of the herding camp of Alinga]
1991
ekaru ngolo ateregege [the year of meningitis]
1992
ekaru ka Apuno [the year of Apuno]
1993
ekaru ngolo a Natoo [the year of Natoo]
1994–95 ekaru ngolo ka akiriket arengepuwa [the year of the initiation of Arengepuwa]
1997–98 ekaru a kolera [the year of cholera]
2000
ekaru ngolo aarere Ekoneakamilyo [the year Ekoneakamilyo was killed]ekaru ngolo acuna ariang Lokopo [the year the army burned Lokopo]
2001
ekaru ngolo aremyoto Ngipian Loroo [the year the Pian raided Loroo]ekaru ngolo ejaaria apukan Ngikarimojong ngatomian [the year the government disarmed the
Karamojong]
2002
ekaru ngolo aremyoto Ngiupe awi a Ngibokora a Namanit [the year the Pokot raided the herding
camp of the Bokora in Naminit]
Appendix 2. Dodoth Event Calendar
1928
ekaru a lokijuka [the year of rushing]
1939
ejie a jiriman [the fight of Germany]ekaru a Locim [the year of Locim]
1943
ekaru arengelaga [the year of red marriage bangles]
1951
ekaru emaase [the year of the locusts]
1959
ekaru kakimaro[the year of counting]1960
ekaru ngolo emeleku ka ngakan [the year of the hoe of hands]
ekaru atwania emusugut a Naurat [the year the white man died in Naurat]
1961
ekaru a Loyoro [the year of Loyoro]
1962
ekaru auru [the year of independence]
1963
ekaru a lolibikipi [the year of green water]
ekaru anagiliigil [the year of the helicopter]1964
aremun Ngididinga Uganda [the Didinga flee to Uganda]
1965
ekaru a lodiri [the year of Lodiri]ekaru a looyamorok Logum [the year of the green vegetables in Logum]
ekaru ka Adungo Alichan [the year of Adungo-Alichan]
1969
ekaru ngolo kakimaro [the year of counting]1971
kikama Amin apukan [Amin took over the government]
akilac ngitunga [to undress people]
1972
kirita Amin Ngimiidi [Amin chased away the Asians]
1973
ekaru atwania akolong (ecapio) [the year the sun died (during weeding)]
1974
ekaru ka bulokku haam [the year of the block farm]
1976
ekaru alobolei [the year of gourds]
1978
ekaru anawokoupal [the year they brought shields]
1979
kirit Obote Amin [Obote chased Amin]
1980
ekaru kakimaro [the year of counting]ekaru a lopiar [the year of sweeping away]
ekaru a Elia [the year of Elia]
1981
ekaru akitanai [the year of feeding]ekaru ngolo anya mere nyicolubei [the year of eating rats]
1982
ekaru ewokere ngimomwa Turkan[the year of carrying Sorghum to the Turkana]
1983
ekaru angarere Lopedo [the year of opening Lopedo]
1984
ekaru a lorengepelu [the year of the red field]
1985
kikama Tito Okello apukan [Tito Okello took over the government]
ekaru a Loumo [the year of Loumo]
1986
kikama Museveni apukan [Museveni took over the government]siripis [three pieces]
1987
Namusali
1989
Tarau Marwas Emupi a Dodoth [Marwas became the MP of Dodoth]1990
eryangiryang [earthquake]36

Ugandan Pastoralists’ Everyday Histories of Gun Acquisition and State Violence

1991
1992
1994
1996
1997
1998
2000
2001
2002

ekaru a lomongin [the year of male animals]
ekaru ateregege [the year of meningitis]
ekaru kakimaro angitunga [the year of counting people]
ekaru ngolo aramareta Nyidodoso ngaitu a Lokongikile [the year the Dodoth raided the cows oflokongikile]
ekaru ngolo aloto ngitunga Loding Turkan [the year people went to the Loding (and Turkana)]
asere ata Museveni [the election of Museveni]
ekaru ngolo alokimul [the year of saliva]
ekaru ngolo agiligil [the year of the helicopter]ekaru arere Limangiro [the year Limangiro was killed]ekaru a gialanarere ngimongin [the year of selling male animals]
ekaru ka abass kakuri [the year of the bus and the dove]ekaru ngolo aramareta Ngijie ngaituk a Lokitela Arengan [the year the Jie raided the cattle in
Lokitela Arengan]asere a Museveni ka Lodou [the elections of Museveni and Lodou]
ekaru ngolo enyakarya ariang ngatomian [the year the soldiers returned the guns]

37