UNHCR’s withdrawal from Kiryandongo: anatomy of a handover

The Kiryandongo settlement for Sudanese refugees is located in the north-eastern corner
of Uganda’s Masindi district. Part of a former cattle ranching area, land there was
gazetted by the Ugandan government for use by refugees in 1990. The first transfers of
refugees took place shortly afterwards, and the settlement is now well established, with
land divided into plots on which people have built houses and have cultivated crops on a
small scale. Anthropological field research (towards a D.Phil. in anthropology, Oxford
University) was conducted in the settlement from October 1996 to March 1997 and
between June and November 1997.
During the course of the fieldwork UNHCR was involved in a definitive process whereby
it sought to “hand over” responsibility for the settlement at Kiryandongo to the Ugandan
government, arguing that the refugees were approaching self-sufficiency and that it was
time for them to be absorbed completely into local government structures. The Ugandan
government was reluctant to accept this new role, and the refugees expressed their
disbelief and feelings of betrayal at the move. These responses provide a starting point
from which to examine the networks of relationships and modes of communication which
existed between the vying interest groups and which are introduced below. Consideration
of the attempt to hand over responsibility offers insights into the positions of the main
players and also demonstrates how their respective involvement with the refugee
situation interacts with their other related concerns. In this sense, an analysis of the way
in which a handover was planned, the kinds of consultation which took place, and the
steps which were taken, situates the settlement in its broader political and economic
context.