Peace for Peace Model of Amnesty (PEPEMA)

The world over, peace treaties have led to the granting of amnesties which unfortunately, many of such treaties have not achieved their intended purpose largely because of the way they are designed. The purpose of this study was to develop a Model of Amnesty that can be used to achieve conflict resolution and ensure sustainable peace after an intractable conflict. The Peace for Peace Model of Amnesty (PEPEMA) is grounded on the fact that if you want peace, you must give peace in return. Most peace treaties that give birth to amnesties usually want to treat former belligerents as the vanquished as state governments want to come out of the conflicts as victors.

This study aimed at developing a workable Model of Amnesty where all parties to the conflict come out of their predicament as winners and not as losers. This was against the backdrop that despite the promulgation of the Amnesty Act (2000) in Uganda, more than two decades todate, there are still rebels still at large that have not exploited the amnesty granted by the Act to abandon rebellion.

Therefore, Peace for Peace Model of Amnesty (PEPEMA) could not have been developed and published at a better time than this. The Peace for Peace Model of Amnesty (PEPEMA) was part of a PhD study by the author entitled Amnesty as a panacea to conflict: An assessment of the Contribution of Amnesty to conflict resolution and sustainable peace in Uganda. The study was grounded on the need to know why rebels opt to remain in subversion despite the existence of an Amnesty Act especially when some of their colleagues abandoned rebellion and were granted amnesty. The study adopted mixed research methods as both quantitative and qualitative study designs were used. A questionnaire was used to collect data from one thousand respondents spread throughout the five districts in Uganda that were studied and each district representing one region out of Uganda’s five regions. In addition, one-on-one interviews were held with several key informants like reporters, families of reporters, Resident District Commissioners of the sampled districts, staff of NGOs that were involved in the receiving of reporters, some sections of the security apparatus, lawmakers, lawyers and religious leaders.

The results of the study revealed that most amnesties do not bring about peaceful conflict resolution and ensure sustainable peace because of the vindictive nature of such Peace Treaties against the perceived losers. The Peace for Peace Model of (PEPEMA) when well understood and implemented to the letter, it can peacefully end deadly conflicts and ensure sustainable peace. This is because PEPEMA is grounded on the belief that beneficiaries of amnesty (former rebels) are dreadful of the individual criminal responsibility incumbent on them upon surrender without an all-inclusive, comprehensive and open-ended Amnesty Act where peace must be given to them in order to achieve peace. In other models of amnesty, peace is achieved but not maintained because the beneficiaries of amnesty are not given the peace they deserve in law and in practice. If this model of amnesty is well implemented, its ability to achieve swift cessation of hostilities and ensure maintenance of sustainable peace is enormous.