Community Dialogue on Cultural Vis a Vis Modern Justice & Reconciliation Approaches: The Case of Compensation of Murder Crimes 

This February 2025, AccessPlus facilitated a dialogue on an evidently very complex death issue that occurred in the previous year and which involved 4 clans in the border district of Northern Uganda. However, despite the cultural justice and reconciliation practices such as Dialogue, Mato-Oput, Compensation in the form of livestock and the payment of bills for the burial that were met by the clans of the 3 alleged perpetrators, 1 of the clans felt that it was an unfair judgment against them.

The case involved a youth of a different clan, who was murdered by 2 other youth from 2 different clans over a misunderstanding at a farm where they were all working as employees. Prior to the murder, the farm owner & employer of the boys had provided a motorbike to one of the employees and sent him to the farm where the other boys were having a conflict, to get more information. However, instead, this boy who had been sent on a motorbike, ganged up with the friend and beat up the victim to death. As such, the clan where the employer, who also doubles as the bike owner who provided the bike to one of the perpetrators, was required to compensate for the loss of the victim.

Clans, among the Acholi people, are social units that define a person’s identity and obligations. Crimes such as murders therefore become the responsibility of the clan and not the individual.

In this particular case, the clan of the employer of the boys at the farm, who was also blamed for providing the motorbike, felt that the judgment and directive that they too, should compensate for the death was unfair. However, they still participated in the reconciliation processes and contributed to the compensation. After their participation in the cultural practice of Mato-Oput, compensation of livestock and contributions towards the burial at the place of the deceased, they came back home and for months, they complained of dissatisfaction with the judgment. Majority of the community blamed the leaders for accepting to compensate something that they were not supposed to pay for, while others claimed that the cultural leaders were practicing favoritism at the expense of other clans.

Additionally, other issues arose amidst this. For instance, in situations where the clan members were reluctant to provide contribution towards the mandatory compensations and did not meet the deadline. The clan leaders of the perpetrators then gave directives to the youth of the clan, to confiscate household items of defaulting members.  Members felt that some of the youth confiscated property worth more than the stipulated amounts.

These complaints, some of them as a result of misunderstanding or genuine confusion, was rather creating more conflicts and divisions instead of the intended reconciliation amongst the 4 clans.

To respond to the complaints and widening divisions, AccessPlus partnered with the local leaders and brought together the community in order to dialogue on the issue. 

The goal of the gathering was for the community to get neutral perspectives on conflicting issues between cultural and modern reconciliation practices.

In attendance were:

• The Security personnel -Scene of Crime Officer [SOCO] Lamwo district, Mr. Francis Lam
• The Security personnel -Child and Family Protection Unit [CFPU], who also deals with women and children issues, particularly on domestic violence and abuse
• The LC 1 -Mr. Onek Richard
• Clan Elders 
• Women Representatives and the general community members.

Other issues and questions that were addressed included:

1. About the youth who grew up outside their clan or father’s family, are not known in their clans or families and neither do they participate in respective clans activities but are committing crimes wherever they are -including murders. Then once they commit the crimes, the other families where these youth grew up from will then trace for the actual clan and send the children back to their clans with the intention that their real clans and families will solve the cases. The families/clans where these youth belong see this as an unfair act, whereas the families where the child grew up see it as unfair for the child’s clan to deny their own child. 
2. How the clan leaders should handle the youth who are seen with drugs but upon delivering them to the police, they would have got rid of the evidence
3. Guidance from the security officers on situations where the community has their own constitution to discipline members of the community who commit some offences. But instead, because these culprits do not want to be punished by the community, they will run for rescue at the police and the police defends them. 
4. Household family conflicts, including gender-based violence and general conduct of couples in the homes.
5. The draft constitution that guides the communities/clan was read out. The security personnel present guided about the gaps in the by-laws that need to be incorporated in the constitution. Additionally, they educated the community about the existence of a children’s court and about the fact that there are scenarios where the police/law enforcers are guided by the by-laws set by the community.

The subregion’s cultural approaches to justice and reconciliation such as the Mato-Opu ritual offer a community-centered way to address the consequences of grave offences such as murder, and restores relationships amongst communities. However, to address existing gaps in these cultural practices to foster long-term peace and unity, there is a need to balance application of the traditional practices and the state mechanisms, while ensuring an inclusive participation of the women, the youth and the elders of the community. The involvement of the law enforcers, who are representatives of the government and were treated as neutral in the cultural matters, provided clear information that calmed the community members.