The dangers of uncritical ethnic allegiance

 

Photo: Mercy Corps

By the Editor

In this address at the 39th Ordinary meeting of African heads of state, President Salva Kiir Mayardit of South Sudan pledged to restore peace to South Sudan.

This is going to be a tall order. The president has been making similar pledges for the last decade. Yet peace remains illusive for the people of South Sudan. What we witness today is the withdrawal into ethnic bases. This is putting civilians and the country at risk. Northern Jonglei State has become a battle ground. Civilians have been displaced, some killed.

But it all begins with the political elite.

But South Sudanese civilians have been caught up in the middle of a war with which they have nothing. Elite start their disagreement over power and political ambitions but then end up passing the suffering to the people. Elite don't suffer the consequences of their actions. They benefit from it. This is South Sudan.

Yet, the very people who are affected by elite selfish actions still stand by these elite. Why? In-group bias as a function of ethnic belonging. Civilians will support political leaders from ethnic group even when these leaders do absolutely nothing for the people. This is the case even when these leaders have in the past put them at risk.

South Sudanese elite therefore stir up the crisis knowing that they will bank on their ethnic basis as a default position. They don't have to say or do anything for their ethnic groups to support them. Political differences among the elite is therefore transformed wittily into an ethnic problem and then to a survivalist issue. "Support us or tribe X will exterminates you!" 

Peace will therefore remain illusive unless South Sudanese unite across ethnic lines. 

In my recent conversation with Dr. Gatluak Thach, two issues emerged. Signing another peace agreement with President Kiir will be tricky because the president has shown that he's not interested in respecting any agreement. On the other hand, war is also not an option. It leads to more suffering and death. It also allows President Kiir, who has turned the country into an authoritarian system, to re-entrench himself. 

Peace and war are therefore both difficult, though not impossible. 

But the most important solution is for the people of South Sudan to stare realizing that the problem is not the people themselves. Tribes are not the problem. Leaders using tribe to gain support are the problem. They should therefore start rejecting leaders who turn South Sudanese against each other.

Will Divine Guidance Rescue South Sudan from Turmoil?

Photo: Radio Tamazuj

There is nothing wrong with having a "national prayer" day. The problem with the government of South Sudan is that it has started to misappropriate religion for political ends. This is exactly what Khartoum's Islamic elite did with Islam. They misappropriated Islam as a political instrument for the subjugation of non-Muslims in Sudan.

Since Khartoum elite from the 1950s have used religion as a power instrument, South Sudanese have countered the imposition of Islam with what nearly borders on Christian fundamentalism. It was, in most cases, for a good reason. But it's now getting misused without any useful social value to the people of South Sudan.

The colonial regimes, with their colonial anthropology, the most compromised of disciplines as late Congolese philosopher V. Y. Mudimbe once argued, did not believe Africans had any religion on the same level with Islam and Christianity. Embracing both Christianity and Islam by South Sudanese was therefore a way to get global recognition.

 Being proselytized into Islam and Christianity was instrumental to South Sudanese and the religious regimes that converted them. It won them the support of western Christendom in the 1960s and the 1990s. 

Today, however, these foreign religions have become integral to the South Sudanese social and cultural fabric. They are no longer foreign religions. 

So when President Salva Kiir of South Sudanese recently called a National Prayer Breakfast, many South Sudanese appreciated it. However, there are many South Sudanese who took offense. Religion in South Sudan seems to have become an instrument for political and social blackmail. It has become a convenient tool the president uses to keep the hungry and destitute populace passive, zombified. 

For many South Sudanese, prayers cannot fix national issues. It will not pay salaries that have not been paid consistently for nearly two years now. Security situation has deteriorated, the economy is in taters, the agreement has been virtually abrogated, and the main signatory to the peace agreement (First Vice President Riek Machar) is undergoing an unnecessary court proceedings. 

These cannot be fixed by prayers. They need leadership from President Kiir. 

A national day of prayer could have been a day of forgiveness with President Kiir leading by example. But he does not. He prioritizes what serves him. He calls on South Sudanese to reject "tribalism, hatred" and embrace "reconciliation." 

However, opposition have noted that this day would have had a meaningful religious significance. Dut Majokdit, a senior political figure in SPLM-IO of Dr. Riek Machar noted that "For this country to realize national reconciliation, it must start from the top leadership." 

This is important. It is important for President Kiir to call South Sudanese to reconcile. But he must also start by reconciling with Dr. Riek Machar, his arch political enemy. 

Edmund Yakani, a prominent South Sudanese civil society leader, echoed Majokdit's words: "We wish the speech of the President could have broken the ground for real forgiveness and reconciliation."

Meaning the human, rather than the divine aspect of the national prayer has a greater chance of bringing stability to South Sudan. Divine guidance is useful only if leaders take initiative on behalf of the people. But when prayers are called only to engage in needless self-absolution, then religion becomes a convenient political tool. 

Reconciliation and forgiveness should not be something others do. It should also be a component of the South Sudanese governance structure. As French deconstructionist and post-modernist philosopher, Jacque Derrida, has noted, what we should give is not just the forgivable but also the unforgivable. 

It is not the divine that will fix South Sudan. It is the human design. 

_______________________

Kuir ë Garang (PhD) is the editor of The Philosophical Refugee.