What happened to Karamoja beef glory?

While I walked in the City Hall, something caught my eyes, not the usual children lined up on the streets carrying younger siblings and asking for livelihood which many say “begging”, but city maps to date still show swamps and wetlands.

Ironically, true to the point that high school geography still lists Karamoja as a beef rearing area, true to the fact that to date the shorthorn Zebu cattle is still supplied to the region (Acholi, Lango, Teso, Bugisu, Busoga and parts of Buganda).

This evidence corroborates the colonial and post-colonial records in the 1950s and 1960s. Karamoja had a livelihood-based economy on beef trade with its neighbours and the region.

Not only did the traders trade in cattle but also camels and other livestock.

This strongly explains the sizeable existence of Somali and Ethiopian Borana communities in the region, well before the break of conflict in their countries. At the time, this blossomed at the entry levels of economy growing with an industrial base, with quality investors such as ESSO, AGIP, Bata, etc. in the region. Bata targeted the hide and skin industry.

However, with the mining base for marble, gold etc. this can still go back to commercial levels, not forgetting developing the competitive beef industry for the region. It will create dignified jobs for people and the region.

These records show that Karamoja can do business with the region and beyond. However, in the stories of marginalisation, I will hold the leaders in the region accountable. Who has created this vulnerability for which we are reduced to discussing iron sheets and yet we can do better.

Is it sensational that we hype the discussion of iron sheets and yet over the years our own leaders have let us down. We are often used to discussing cattle raids in all meetings. Well, this residual and low-grade insecurity should be handled by the army with the available institutions. Let the leaders of the region see themselves in a ‘clean mirror’, who will cast the first stone.

Since time memorial leaders in the region have mortgaged the region for their own benefit, state scholarships have been given to family members, friends and in-laws; clandestine family contracts parceling out land into business bonanzas. Unfortunately, Karamoja is ‘full of talking heads with few working hands’.

However, over the years development sociologists and the ethnographers have always put this society in protective mode and as a value, it does add to their survival and odds of risk to their existence.

The question should be: If we changed the diet for Karamoja, can we too change the appetite for the region. Political leaders’ appetite for risking Karamoja seems always insatiable, one would be tempted to say, there seems to be untamed appetite for the region since colonial times. Let’s change her diet and it will reduce the appetite of the suitors.  

In conclusion, societal livelihoods take precedence as a survival strategy for example if cricket in India is more than a game but a religion then cattle keeping is more than a livelihood but a religion too in Karamoja. Imagine if the iron sheet saga was an activity to deprive them of watering their animals, definitely they would be up in arms. The case being, a community seemingly remote to survival strategy that keeps them less interested but definitely disenfranchised. 

Dr Justice Elima is the director of Masaka Regional Referral Hospital. He worked in Karamojafor 17 years and is a resident of Moroto for the last 26 years.