Survivors of the 2004 attack on Barlonyo displaced peoples’ camp in Ogur Sub County Lira district, have asked the government to consider pardoning the captured Lord’s Resistance Army—LRA rebel commander, “Major General” Caesar Acellam.
On February 21, 2004, suspected LRA rebel fighters attacked Barlonyo IDP camp killing more than 300 people and injuring several others.
But those who survived now say that pardoning Achellam, a senior LRA figure who was captured by the UPDF in Central African Republic 10 days ago, would encourage other rebel commanders and their fighters to voluntarily surrender.
Martin Okello, a resident of Barlonyo trading centre and whose close relatives were killed in the attack, says Achellam should be granted amnesty.
Okello says even if the captured LRA rebel commander is prosecuted, as the victims and survivors, they will not benefit anything from it. Instead it may discourage other fighters from returning home.
Joyce Munu, another victim of the LRA atrocities discourages the use of violent and brutal ways to ending the war.
Munu says since Acellam is not on the list of indicted members of the LRA group, he should be forgiven by the government in the spirit of promoting peace and unity.
It is not yet known whether the state would consider prosecuting Achellam like his former colleague, Colonel Thomas Kwoyelo, who was also captured in 2009 in the Democratic Republic of Congo by the UPDF troops.
Col. Kwoyelo has since engaged government in a legal battle over its failure to grant him amnesty like other former rebels. Last year, Kwoyelo was charged with 53 counts of war crimes before the International Crimes Division of the High Court, but his trial also hit a snag after being blocked by the Constitutional Court. Kwoyelo, however, still remains in Luzira government prison in what appears to be illegal detention.
