SUCCESS STORY:

Story teller: Teso Religious Leaders Efforts for Peace and Reconciliation (TERELEPAR).

Place: Kateta sub-county.

Title: Conflict Mediation as a tool of harnessing Peace and Freedom.

Kateta sub-county is located in Serere District in Teso sub region-Uganda is one of the most populated sub-counties in the entire district due to vast and fertile land which attracted people from elsewhere, and the lake showers around which harbor fishing communities. Due to high number of people occupying the place there are also high number of believers hailing from different religious backgrounds and among them are Catholics, Protestants, Muslims, and born-again faith.

Although all of them believes that there is paradise after death and this can be inherited through good deeds and practical actions of following God’s commandments and full filing them while still alive on earth. This sounded like a gospel relic to some of them due to the divisions and heartrate most of them have against each other or one another either due to lack of knowledge and understanding on their way of worship, doctrines, beliefs, traditions, norms, canon laws, dogmatic teaching, hymns, prayer books or practices they believe as the rightful way of adoring, communicating and presenting their prayers to their living God. Also, the tension between the Muslim and the Christians over the right to slaughtering the animals and this resulted into serious conflict that resulted to the Christian faithful to have their own abattoir, eating places, and water points.

Several attempts by the Muslim and Christian leaders at the district level to intervene through dialogues and mediations to reunite and reconcile were futile. Since no positive result was realized, instead the conflicts between the Muslims and Christians kept worsening and some of them pointing it as a deliberate move to undermine their religion and convert them from their faith.

These indifferences caused defamation and denigration of some religions hence giving a rise to more conflicts and tensions among those believers. This for time immoral has never enabled them to have not even a single occasion where they have come together to have a prayer session or conference under one church roof.

TERELEPAR with support from JISRA, enhanced the capacity of the female and male religious actors from both the Muslim and Christian backgrounds in order to promote individual freedom of religion and belief, and their faith community at large.

As a result of the empowerment trainings under JISRA program, the newly established women and youth groups intervened and engaged their faith communities through dialogue meetings to discuss various issues which affect their faith and their communities at large while drawing prospective way forward. These meetings created a deeper understanding and tolerance of the different practices and beliefs each religion believes in. However, due to the outcome of dialogues, their coexistence was enhanced and relationships were restored, and efforts for joint work in promoting Freedom of Religion within their faith established.

The dialogues, capacity building on ADR methodology and other program interventions have also attracted the commitment by various Christians and Muslim leaders, Government stakeholders like Gombolola Internal Security Officer (GISO), Community Development Officer (CDO) and other key stakeholders to exhibit high support towards the use of Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) approach to resolve conflicts.

By enhancing the capacity of religious actors under the JISRA program, TERELPAR has empowered religious actors and stakeholders to embrace and own mediation as a tool of resolving the emerging conflicts in their communities. The trained religious actors are seen taking proactive measures in peace building and conflict transformation and are seen as independent and trusted in dispensing justice to the vulnerable groups and reconciling the worrying parties and restoring the broken relationship between or among the different religions and communities within the project scope and beyond.

The grade one magistrate court in Serere district, including the officer of the Local council 3 court, Community development Office and other stakeholders do refer back some of the cases reported to them by the community for mediation by the trained religious actors in the area. This demonstrates the trust and the potential they are having for scaling the approach to other parts of the district and the region as well.

However, Kateta sub-county still faces a number of conflicts of all categories which are now being resolved through mediation, collaboration with different stakeholders, dialogue meetings, reconciliation, conciliation and arbitration. Thousands of the vulnerable groups still face similar challenges within Kateta sub-county and beyond. As TERELEPAR, we believe with your individual or collective support, TERELEPAR can continue to train more religious actors as mediators and promote mediation as a tool of promoting justice and reconciliation among the churches, vulnerable groups and the conflicting parties in Kateta sub-county and beyond.

Join us in promoting peace and conflict transformation. Donate today to help us skill more mediators to dispense justice to the vulnerable group through mediation approach.