President Kiir is a "Constitutional President" not a 'Democratically Elected President!"

Most of us in South Sudan are not independent thinkers even when we pretend we are! Some South Sudanese writers and thinkers in Southern States of the country support Federalism not because they’ve actually looked into the inherent benefits to the constituents of the region but because the majority of the citizens embrace it given their flimsy understanding of the system, or because vocal voices in their areas support it, or that, they believe, it’ll give them an opportunity to get rid of the ‘occupiers’ on their land.

None of the supporters of Federalism has ever advanced any convincing reason that’s not either reminiscent of the infamous 1980s ‘Kokora’ or the regionalized tribalism and regionalist sycophancy.  States have governors, parliaments, state MPs, State laws. We somehow have a system that’s structurally resembling other Federal Systems in the world. What is lacking is to actually give more powers to the states and limiting president’s interference in state affairs.

And those who oppose Federalism do so because they support the government and the government opposes it. And the government has absolutely no credible reason advanced in opposition to the system and why they think Federalism would be bad. The only reason they have is that Riek has rekindled the flame of Federalism. This is not the first time Riek has done something like this. Riek feeds on popular aspirations of the people and exploits them.

Self-determination wasn’t a darling of the SPLA/SPLM until Dr. Riek and Dr. Lam made it their focal point in Abuja I in 1992. It was only one of the alternatives in Dr. John’s famous multi-layered Vend Diagrams but not the preferred alternative. UNITY of Sudan was! The two doctors wanted to outsmart Dr. John Garang. However, the way Dr. John changed astonished not only the doctors, but Garang’s friends in the National Democratic Alliance (NDA). Garang embraced Self-Determination to the chagrin of the Nasir duo and even made it central to Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA); giving birth to Referendum!

Riek and Lam had met an ideological propagandists, ideological chameleon, and also, an ideological wizard who couldn’t be outsmarted.

So folks who oppose Federalism are doing so because people they support don’t like it. They’ve not presented any convincing reason why they oppose it.

This is our major problem. We ally based on irrational positions we hide in ideological, tribalized regionalism and intellectualized tribalism.

We don’t think for ourselves!

That’s why we hear time and again from South Sudanese officials and government supporters that President Salva Kiir Mayardit is a “democratically elected president” of South Sudan!

No! President Kiir was a democratically elected president of the government of ‘Southern Sudan.’ He’s a CONSTITUTIONAL President of the Republic of South Sudan. There was no election held after the independence of South Sudan! None!

Racism vs. racism: Racial pride vs. Radicalization of Racial pride

Racism is simply the idea that one’s race is better than any other race. This is a natural perception, assumption or feeling about one’s race. Taking it in itself by itself, it’s benign. We all believe that there’s something special about ourselves or our race. This is a natural feeling about one’s self no one should be denied. We all can express it all we want.

Europeans can pride in who they are and Africans can pride in who they are.

If pride in one’s race isn’t the problem then what’s the problem?

While a simple pride in one’s race is acceptable, the application of that pride in one’s race is what we need to keep our eyes on. Some people believe that their race is the best and stop from there…they don’t go any farther.  Others believe their race is the best but take it a little farther. They either flaunt the success of their race with flamboyant arrogance or they use that pride to make sure that others feel bad about their race. In a word, they use the pride in their race as an instrument to not only pride in their race, but to make sure that other races are not only put down, but that the conceptual distance between themselves and other Races is greatly increased.

One might feel bad or sad when put down through racial pride but that’s not the evil of racism. That’s more about one’s emotional strength then it’s about any truth about races.

But that still, by itself is not the problem!

So being proud of your race (even with excessive edge) is not the problem. And using that pride in one’s race to put others down, while bad, isn’t the major problem in what we consider the evil of ‘Racism.’

So what’s the problem with race and Racism?

A feeling about one’s self is innate. It’s not something you create! While it might be enhanced by some factors within one’s social environment, one’s general feeling about oneself is natural. So one’s feeling about one’s race is a bigger version of one’s feeling about one’s race.

Feeling about one’s self à pride in one’s family à pride in one’s collective group à pride in one’s race
This is simply a natural progression and there’s nothing wrong or unnatural about it.

Here’s where the problem lies when it comes to racism.

There are effectivizing factors that play into racism to make it either effective or affecting. These are the instrumentalizing issues I call Instigating Factors. And these are the factors that determine the evils that originate from racism.

Some of these factors are

-          Hatred
-          Power
-          Wealth
-          Bigotry (religious or otherwise)
-          Poverty

The Pros and Cons of President Museveni’s 'intervention' and the lessons we can learn from it

photo: http://www.personal.psu.edu/

Ugandan, or rather, Museveni’s ‘intervention’ in South Sudan’s conflict has caused various reactions in Africa and especially in South Sudan depending on one’s political allegiance. There are those who oppose or support the ‘intervention’ on principle and there are those who support or oppose it given their political colors.

Like always, I support or oppose any given political incident given the valuation I give it. For me, Museveni’s intervention has both negative and positive aspects to it. And both of these have something to teach not only the South Sudanese people but the Ugandans themselves; who seem to be in a deep political slumber; or a hypnotic semblance of democracy.

While there are positive sides to this ‘intervention’, the ‘intervention’ is largely negative because it’s self-interest motivated and unintelligibly pursued.

Pros of Museveni’s Intervention

The White Army and the Nuer soldiers who joined Dr. Riek Machar in his Rebellion didn’t do so because they wanted to per se. It’s very clear that they did so as a response to the reported massacres of unarmed Nuer civilians in Juba. This tells me that had the ‘White Army’ advanced to Juba or captured Juba, the city would have been a grotesque scene of massive tribal genocide. My reasoning rests on the fact that the White Army had and still has no clear political agenda. With no doubt, they only wanted to take revenge regarding what they heard coming out of Juba.

This is manifest in what they did in Bor, Malakal and Bentiu and other areas they mindlessly ravaged.

Museveni’s ‘intervention’ therefore helped prevent the capture of Juba and the avoidance of what would have been a massive genocide.

We also need to remember also that had Riek and the White Army captured Juba, President Kiir wouldn’t have just given up and leave Riek Machar to assume presidency. Having seen how the president relies so much on his Jieeng tribesmen, it’s conceivable that the president would have actually mobilized the Jieeng tribe to reclaim his presidency or wage a guerrilla-style war.

Whatever the case would have been, the capture of Juba would have been a disaster for South Sudan because the WA would have done what they did in Bor, Bentiu and Malakal by going on a killing rampage!

Another positive consequence of Museveni’s ‘intervention’ is the fact that it showed South Sudan’s leadership that a strong, cohesive, well-trained and always-paid-on-time army is crucial for national defense.

The Cons of Museveni’s Intervention

Museveni and Uganda People’s Defense Force (UPDF) made a mockery of not only the South Sudanese national army but also, South Sudanese generally. Had President Museveni been a conscientious leader who’s helping out a fellow president, Museveni would have put his UPDF forces under the solid command of the SPLA without any exception.

Twi Leaders, History Distortion and its Implication for South Sudan (Part I)

photo: ilovehistory.utah.gov

What would you do to leaders who want to benefit politically by sacrificing the truth about their own ethnic history? How would you call leaders who advise young people to forget about their history because it’s inconveniencing the falsehood and the political cocoon they’ve built for their selfish interests? How would you trust leaders who can’t unite their own counties but dream of being national leaders in South Sudan? Where in the world does an adult tell young, enthusiastic, truth-seeking people to never, ever talk about their own history? Would you trust a leader who tells his own kids to not be proud of their authentic history and embrace a vilifying, demeaning reality? Too many questions, I know!

Unfortunately, this is exactly what Twi leaders of Jonglei state tell their young people and the less informed populace.

Writers read to authenticate or defend what they write! As I continue to grow, read and discover realities about myself and where I come from, I continue to get appalled at how distorted my own history has become and how leaders from my own county (Twi) are sleeping on the truth in order to protect their interests. If these leaders are decided on destroying our history for their interests, then I’ll expose them to South Sudanese in order to protect my daughter from an impending future in which people pride in falsehood because it’s beneficial. She’ll grow up knowing the value of truth and respect for others.

Destroy our history and we’ll destroy you! Mess with our history and you’re messing with my daughter’s authentic pride and sense of self. And that, my people, is what Europeans and Arabs did to us! Who can allow that AGAIN?!

Some Arabs and the Europeans distorted our sense of pride and historical truth. Why would I want my own leaders to do the same?

Historically, we’ve always been the Twi Dinka, Nyarweng Dinka, Bor Dinka, Hol Dinka, Rek Dinka, Aliap Dinka, Thoi Dinka, Rut Dinka, Twic Dinka, Agar Dinka, Malwal Dinka, Ciec Dinka…etc. That was beautiful not divisive!

Administrative realities have distorted everything so many people refer collectively to Twi, Nyarweng, Hol and Bor as Dinka Bor. How can Bor be a subset of itself?

So Moulana Abel Alier and Dr. John Garang De Mabior are considered to both be Dinka Bor; or Kuol Manyang and Majak D’Agoot are all considered to be Dinka Bor. Dr. Majak and Dr. John are Twi Dinka while Honourable Kuol Manyang and Moulana Abel Alier are Bor Dinka. This was true in the past and is now true; however, politics and personal interests have distorted it. It’s therefore high time someone who has nothing to lose but to point out the truth speaks up. As a writer who does research, there’s no way in hell I can disregard documented history that correlate the words of our ancestors. I owe it to my daughter and the future generation.  (See the attached list of readings for more information!)

The Twi people

The Twi Section of the Jieeng of Jonglei State is currently housed by ‘Twic East County.’ Regrettably, these people have been shuttled between different administrative districts from the colonial period to the present to the point that their ethnic reality has been distorted by their own leaders and the outsiders that are feeding on what these leaders present. Of notable districts that the Twi people have been part of are the former ‘Bor District’ since the early 20^th century and the former ‘Kongor District’ from the 1970s until the SPLA war.

The Bor District was named after the Bor people, the now inhabitants of the ‘Bor County.’ Kongor District was named after one section of the Twi Dinka. The use of the name of a given section within the larger community has created problems. Naming the District of Twi, Kongor created many problems as other Twi sections didn’t want their district named after one of their fellow sections of Twi. However, Kongor was also a government post named after the section of Kongor so the administrators were naming the district after the town; which unfortunately was the name of one section of the Twi. It’s good to remember that the Kongor section never referred to the whole of the Twi people as ‘Dinka Kongor.’

The ‘Federal System’ in South Sudan is not the solution

Photo: http://apgopohannahbrown.blogspot.ca/

Since SPLM-in-Opposition declared their preference for constitutional Federal System in South Sudan, there’s been a lot of heated debate by South Sudanese in the government, in the opposition, in the media and on the street. Understandably, the discussion pits those who support it against those who don’t support it.

While I don’t have any problem with the Federal System per se, I don’t believe it’s going to solve any of our problems now and in the future. It’s true that we need a complete overhaul of our political governance and social systems in South Sudan; however, we need to understand that for any systemic transparency to work, the leadership’s attitude, the citizen-citizen relations and the general understanding of power structure, have to change. As long as the leadership’s attitude and its perception of power and the country remain the same, it doesn’t matter what system we institute in South Sudan, we’ll always remain in a mess.

Unless we have both a good system and good people in leadership, things will remain the same: bad. A good system and a bad leadership or a good leadership and a bad system are all the same: bad!

We need to understand also that a Federal System will not auto-create. The constitutional provisions that will create and inform it will still need the cooperation of all the stakeholders in the country.  It wouldn’t be a mere importation of foreign Federal Systems such as the one in Nigeria, Ethiopia, Canada, USA or any other federated governance system in the world. There has to be internal, idiosyncratic realities to be put into account.

Since power in South Sudan is concentrated in the hand of one man, the opposition see the Federal System as another way to clip the presidential powers.

However, I personally don’t think a Federal System is what we need now. All we need is a well-informed, broad-based and structured decentralization of power. What we have now is actually a form of a Federal System (even if it’s not constitutionally stated as such) as we have state parliaments and governments. It’s therefore important that state governments be given greater and functional autonomy.

This means that ministries such as Education, Agriculture, and law enforcement sectors should be given to the states. Besides, there should be no presidential and national government’s interference in running the affairs of the states; such as the removal of the governors by the president or the president being consulted by the governor on the appointment of state ministers.

State constitutions should have constitutional clauses or provisions on how to remove or replace the governors. Since governors are elected officials, they need to be removed in the same democratic manner by the state parliament as stipulated in the state constitution. And more importantly, there has to be a very well-regulated economic leeway for the states to create their own functional economic systems, internally and externally; nationally and internationally.