The Danger of Uganda's open-ended engagement in South Sudan

The parliament of Uganda yesterday, amidst accusations and counter responses, managed to muscle through a unanimous decision to ratify the UPDF presence in South Sudan. As clearly observed earlier, the necessity of the UPDF to salvage the situation in the world’s newest country in itself, wasn’t up for much debate. The MPs and the ruling party (with ‘its army’) only differed on the two most contentious issues in this intervention; the UPDF’s mandate and the time frame within which to execute that mandate.  

The government of Uganda under President Museveni decided to send troops to South Sudan within days after the conflict had broken out among the ranks of the South Sudanese presidential guard in what President Salva Kiir described as a failed attempted coup. The initial explanation given for the UPDF deployment was to facilitate the evacuation of about 200,000 Ugandans and other foreigners living and doing business in South Sudan. As queries kept streaming in from Journalists, Legislators and ordinary Ugandans first about the numbers given by the Ugandan authorities believed to be of Ugandan citizens then trapped in the war zone, and about the deployment mandates and guidelines, the government changed its explanation.

The UPDF through the President of Uganda, had been asked by President Salva Kiir to intervene and protect key installations including Juba International Airport and the Presidential palace inter alia. This is provided for under Section 40 of the UPDF Act which requires the host country to enter into a “Status of Force Agreement” with the Minister of Defence of the country providing the troops. This seems to have been done accordingly. However, the disturbing reports from newsmen on the ground stating the UPDF involvement to the extent of providing financial aid to South Sudan and indiscriminately bombing villages flat in the disputed Jonglei state don’t quite fit into the criteria of ‘securing key installations’.  

Essentially, one would think that the mandate of the UPDF would revolve more specifically around creating a peaceful buffer for safe evacuation of people both by road and air, and protecting key infrastructure from invasion by the armed rebels. However, all reports and accounts coming from South Sudan indicate the rather disturbingly offensive approach taken by the UPDF. We must understand that the crisis in South Sudan is a political one. Though with ethnic undertones, the ultimate question is Political and governance related in nature and Uganda should not be seen to take sides in such a conflict. Let me state clearly that I do not support the toppling of a democratically elected government using violent/ military means. Those methods were perhaps justified in the past centuries.  

I agree that it was perhaps necessary for Uganda to intervene and prevent the violence that was and probably still is a ticking time bomb that could escalate into genocide considering its ethnic dimension. However, I would have preferred this intervention to be effected within the framework of the Inter Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) or the African Union, just as Kenya, Ethiopia and others approached the situation. That way, it wouldn’t have been as easy for Uganda to take sides and act as peace ‘enforcers’ instead of peace’ keepers’.

It’s a fact that Uganda is probably the biggest loser from the instability in S.Sudan among the neighbours, with the new country being Uganda’s largest export market valued at an average of 250 million dollars annually, and being credited to have aided Uganda to sort of dodge the Economic meltdown of 2008. The Economic justification for salvaging the situation is plausible, but it’s not reason enough for an open-ended engagement in South Sudan’s internal conflict. The UPDF engagement should be ratified by the AU, IGAD and should have specificity in approach and time frame and should by all means be neutral.

Questions are still lingering about the Constitutionality of President Salva Kiir’s invitation of another country to intervene in a matter of internal political conflict. Uganda should have asked itself these questions before hurrying into military intervention outside evacuation operations.  I believe the ‘imminent threat’ posed by the LRA utilising a tumultuous South Sudan is no longer a clearly justifiable reason. The LRA is on the verge of extinction with the few remaining fighters hiding in Central African Republic. Therefore active combat involvement in an internal conflict against a certain section of citizens of South Sudan is absurd.

One wonders what could happen if Machar’s rebels won this war. Or if the Addis Ababa team work out a power sharing agreement between the two warring factions. Does Uganda expect it to be business as usual after that? Will the Nuer people of South Sudan just let Ugandan business men to go in as usual and conduct their business? Will they just conveniently forget that Uganda supported their rivals? Will they not view Ugandan’s through the lenses of the UPDF and their exploits? Will Riek Machar and his army generals forget the aggression occasioned by the UPDF on their people? Will the UPDF concede ‘defeat’ and withdraw if Riek Machar’s Rebels win or they will recruit and deploy more and more troops to continue dying on the battle field? How long is the UPDF prepared to stay in South Sudan? What is the exit strategy here? Has Uganda evaluated the situation to realize that Kiir should take part of the blame for this chaos due to his reckless and indifferent decisions? We know the disadvantages of an open-ended involvement in conflict if we can draw lessons from the US invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan. How long will it be before the UPDF soldiers start raping, looting and committing despicable acts in that country out of frustration. The rebels have put their foot down asking for their detained colleagues to be released before a cessation of hostilities can be agreed. President Kiir, backed by the UPDF, has made it clear that he won’t budge. How exactly does the IGAD expect peace talks in Addis Ababa to proceed when Uganda is busying itself with aerial bombardments of rebel held villages and towns? If the peace talks break down and Machar’s rebels resort to guerilla tactics, will the UPDF continue to fight them considering the Kiir’s forces are not in position to achieve military victory on its own? And the million dollar question; who is paying for all of this?

Uganda must think about this situation with very sober judgment. The UPDF might have got the ratification it needed from parliament to deploy in South Sudan, but that should not be used as a blank cheque. Mistakes have been made by Uganda and both sides in South Sudan and the solution is not taking sides in military action. The solution lies in political engagement and dialogue. Uganda should facilitate this dialogue in every way possible while pursuing a neutral position and withdraw its troops as soon as they can because clearly, the answers for the above questions will come at a very hefty price which I’m not sure Ugandans will be comfortable paying.