Understanding Conflict:
Tepethland is not like Moroto town. Whereas you get mixed up every evening with raucous musical sound and noise of drunken brethrens and sisters while in town, real peace and tranquillity prevails while in Tapac - a typical indigenous African village setting. So I took advantage of this reverential environment behind the mountain to read and complete David Augsburger’s book, Conflict Mediation Across Cultures (Pathways and Patterns).
In it, Augsburger explores the true description of conflict, the fuel to it in the traditional time and at the contemporary moment. He also presents some plausible ways of handling clashes from corner to corner in different traditions. I found the book so rich, so challenging and very relevant to my current work, but also good for mending the existing (but-not easily visible) misapprehension between different people who live and work in Karamoja today.
I liked this observation: "conflict is a visible sign of human energy; it is the evidence of human urgency; it is the result of competitive striving for the same goals, rights and resources." Augsburger writes that disputes are part and partial of human nature much as most times it is destructive, he says it is also remarkably constructive!
The author reminded me of "The Opportunity we missed" debate, some two months ago. Here was when one open minded member of the Karimojong community sighted ‘a wrong’ in the way of sharing family fate as one people. The family dogs barked at the boy, and the boy’s relatives almost killed the dogs. It was fire. But Augsburger would curse my brothers who exchanged live bullets at the time, yet he would also say that the clash was necessary.
The book says "if a group were found in which such ebb, flow and counter flow did not exist; it would show no discernible life process". It goes on to emphasise, "in one society unwelcome words or deeds may be met with immediate violence, in another with covert attack through ... witchcraft or curse, a third moves toward compromise or conciliation. In some, a wrong requires retaliation, in others restraint. In one group honour is regained by revenge, in another honour is lost by retaliation since it lowers the avenger to the level of the offender". And my memory tells that the conflict fuelled by "the Opportunity we missed "debate openly lowered the fighters of the ‘wrong’ to -below the level of the offender!
I also learnt that global growth has come with gadgets that are now active in fuelling conflicts; these are industrialisation, urbanisation and technicalization. "All encourage contact among people, competition between increased visibility of inequities, injustices and inertia in social institutions." Thus, facebook, twitter, the use of phones, newspapers, radio, T.V and blogs are some obvious prerequisites for conflicts in today’s world. They encourage contact with strangers; they encourage participation in a discussion of a topic coined by strangers...
Personally I’ve ever hit my nose on media fuelled conflicts. Three months ago, a stranger - woman whose facebook face is the only thing I know insulted and worried me. I thought she would divorce her husband –just because she failed to understand the chat message that I unknowingly posted on her wall. Another chaos came my way when I posted a security story on a networking site; members cursed my actions to a point where others wanted my job to go to the dogs.
Indeed, the internet has become a very dangerous platform in a way, as rebel groups also use it for making revelations on the damages they cause. The al-Qaida network for instance uses the internet to threaten the world or to claim responsibility for killings or destructions committed. The Al-Sha-bab militants in Somalia are also in this business and several professional corn-men the world over as well use the internet platform or the media at large to make money through abduction of individuals and asking for ransom.
Other common fights that now live in the Karimojong working environment are those caused by such things as: Greed; greed is healthy but it hurts not only people, but the work goal. In most cases one man can assume to be more energetic, knowledgeable enough to do a single task so that -selfishly he/she can eat large. As we must know, ` team is stronger than individual.’ There is also prejudice; discriminatory characters judge others unfairly according to ethnicity, sex, skin, social status or regions of origin. Life and work become so traumatic and the targets are buried.
I pray and sob for the restoration of fairness, the adoption of merit systems and professionalism in our working environments, here in Karamoja, in our Country, in the African continent and indeed the world over. An open approach to settling conflicts and solving problems in my view would definitely make the world a far better planet to spend our lives. Off to the weekend house...
