When Museveni and his National Resistance Army (NRA) took power in 1986, northern Ugandan suffered various rebellions. All groups were stopped in a few years, apart from the Lord’s Resistance Army of Joseph Kony that would cause insecurity for the next 20 years. In the words of one villager in Kitgum district ‘since the new government came, we have not had peace of mind up to now.’

From 1986-1987, the NRA started rolling out the system of Resistance Councils all over Uganda. This formed the basis of the new local government structure. In Northern Uganda, it was not easy to establish this system due to on-going rebellion. People were reluctant to elect people in the Resistance Councils, as they were targeted by especially the LRA. The LRA perceived the RCs as arms of government, as collaborators and therefore disloyal Acholi. When I talk to people that had been in the first Resistance Councils, they tell me how they would sleep in the bush to hide themselves. They would never keep their books and stamps at home, but burry them somewhere. They were also responsible for leading soldiers to the places where rebels were thought to be hiding. ‘I was very scared. They could see me, I was not a soldier so had to be the RC. I was afraid the first bullet would be for me’.

Many members of the Resistance Council were abducted and killed. The work they were doing was complicated in many ways. The village meetings and local courts they were supposed to organise, were often disturbed when rumours reached the village that rebels were approaching. Everyone would simply run off. If a meeting was possible, they would mostly discuss security issues rather than improving the standards in the village.

With the 1995 Constitution, the Resistance Council was changed into Local Councils (LCs), which were guided by the subsequent Local Government Act (1997). LCs were responsible for planning development activities. However, in large areas of Northern Uganda the first large scale IDP camps started. In these camps, a parallel governance structure was put in place formed by Block Leaders and Camp Commandant. The role of the LCs was reduced to nearly nothing. As the camps continued up to 2008, the LCs have had very little experience with carrying out their functions.

Apart from the LCs being directly targeted by rebels, their work turned out to be very different than in other parts of Uganda and was then interrupted by camp life – in some areas as much as 10 years.

What I see the LCs do at the moment is passing information from the sub-county to the village and stamping letters. That is pretty much it. Not fulfilling more of a leadership role, taking initiatives and representing the issues of the community. But we cannot really expect more, can we?