Being non-partisan and being neutral: The tenuous distinction that frustrates many

I am non-partisan. I am not neutral. Many people find this strange, even frustrating. I don't blame them. Being non-partisan should be strange to people who don't understand it from a personalized perspective I will explain here. 

I am going to make a distinction between being neutral and being non-partisan. This distinction is going to sound like what philosophers call a distinction without a difference. But hear me out. 

This is important. 

For many people, being "non-partisan" is synonymous with being "neutral" when issues with serious moral implications are being discussed. For instance, a neutral person would not blame one party to the conflict without blaming the other party. To remain neutral, the neutral person or organization must find something to praise or criticize on both sides. 

For many people, this is prudent. It ensures the neutral person or organization maintains the neutrality status. We see this necessary official neutrality with the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS), the African Union (AU), IGAD,  troika countries (Norway, USA and UK), for instance. 

In most of their press releases or press conferences, they consistently "urge all parties to the conflict" to either "show restraint", "protect civilians" or "implement the agreement." They avoid addressing one party at a time. Adopting this approach is maintained most of the time even when they know that only one party to the agreement or conflict is  to blame. 

That's the general understanding and approach to neutrality. 

But I think this approach and understanding can be problematic. It can make some parties minimize the societal impact of their mistakes. 

But this is the standard language and approach diplomats use. It is not meant to lead to a solution, necessarily. Its primary aim is to maintain a modicum of positive working relationship between sovereign states. There is a critical diplomatic point beyond which diplomats don't tread. Unless they do not hold the host country in high regard or they do not care about diplomatic any consequences. 

As we have seen regarding the involvement of the regional and international bodies in Sudan and South Sudan, the success of agreements does not depend on the mediators per se. Not really. It depends on the quality of the leaderships of the warring parties or peace partners. For instance, the comprehensive peace agreement (CPA) that was signed in 2005 between SPLM and NCP succeeded not because of IGAD and General Lazaro Sumbeiywo, necessarily. Its success depended very much on the leadership of John Garang of SPLA and Ustaz Ali Osman Taha. 

This is not to take away from the incredible work of General Sumbeiyo and IGAD. But their role, as we would witness with the Agreement on the resolution of conflict in South Sudan (ARCISS), could not produce the same results as the CPA because of lack of a serious leadership with which mediators could work. The friendly relationship developed by Dr. John Garang and Ustaz Taha could not be replicated by Dr. Riek Machar and President Salva Kiir.

The neutrality we witness among regional and international parties in South Sudan is a face-serving mechanism. It is not meant to find a solution. It is meant to ensure a peaceful working relationship that serves the interest of the diplomatic mission is maintained. 

To me, being non-partisan and being neutral are not the same. Being non-partisan means I am not beholden to stand by and defend what a given political entity or organization stands for. Political parties will defend their positions by emphasizing their achievements and downplaying their mistakes or failures. You will never find a political entity that focuses on their mistakes and airs them to the public. Even when a political party admits its mistakes and failures, it will ensure it puts a strong emphasis on their achievements in order to overshadow their failures. 

However, opposition political entities will only focus on the failures of other parties. They will either ignore or downplay the achievements of the party they are opposing. This is where I am different. And this is where I need to emphasize how being non-partisan and being neutral should be considered different by South Sudanese and others. 

Let me give an example from South Sudan. I do not have any political allegiance to SPLM-IG and SPLM-IO. And I don't have any principled opposition to them either. I criticize them wherever they make mistakes and praise them whether they do what in my opinion is good for the people of South Sudan. But I do not do what IGAD, Troika, UNMISS and others do. I don't criticize them equally to maintain neutrality. That flies on the face of social reality. 

When SPLM-IO commits atrocities against civilians, I criticize them without looking for ways to also criticize SPLM-IG in order to be considered "neutral". A neutral person or party either refrains from criticizing at all, or finds something to criticize in SPLM-IG before they make their criticism of SPLM-IO public. I don't do that. I criticize SPLM-IO without worrying about whether nor not they will consider me pro-SPLM-IG. I don't worry about being seen as having compromised neutrality.

I also criticize SPLM-IG when it makes mistakes or commit atrocities through the national army, SSPDF. I don't need to bring in SPLM-IO all the time unless SPLM-IO has also committed atrocities in the same conflict. I don't worry that SPLM-IG will characterize me as pro-SPLM-IO. In fact some do. But that doesn't worry me. 

So I can criticize one party at a time. I do not need to think about being neutral. My position is based on what is good or bad for the people of South Sudan and the world. I don't have to worry about what a given political or military party thinks. So I can also agree with SPLM-IO or SPLM-IG as long as I believe what they are saying or doing at that given time is good for the people of South Sudan. 

So when I agree with SPLM-IO's position, it is very easy for people to conflate that agreement with partisan allegiance. I have also seen that members of SPLM-IO have mistaken my agreement with them as my allegiance to SPLM-IO. SPLM-IG members and President Kiir supporters have also mistaken this agreement to be my support for SPLM-IO. 

No. I base my criticism or praise on what I believe is good for the people of South Sudan and other vulnerable people of the world. 

It is also important to note that being a critic of the government puts a person most of the time in the same column of critics with the opposition. A writer or a person engaged in any activist or journalistic work will try most of the time to hold the government or the incumbent leadership accountable more it holds the opposition accountable. This is because the government makes more consequential decisions than the opposition. 

The main difference is that the opposition will find it extremely difficult, if not impossible, to entertain the achievements of the party they oppose or the ruling party. They try as much as possible to find something to criticize or critique in the other party's achievements. It would defeat the purpose of being an opposition if they focus on what is good for the people if it goes against their party interest.

Parties do not prioritize people. They prioritize their political and ideological interest. But they use people as selling points and cover.

So when I say  "I am not partisan", I do not mean "I am neutral." I can spend a week criticizing one party without criticizing other parties if I believe the party I am criticizing is being more destructive to the people of South Sudan. This means I am not neutral in this case. But I am still non-partisan. That in itself does not mean I have joined the parties I have not criticized for a week. Time comes when I focus on their mistakes and praise the party I previously criticized.  Neutral people do not do that. 

So when I say "I am non-partisan" on my social media platforms or on #KuirthiyTV, this is what I mean. 

___

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

The Troika should up the ante against Juba if their words are to have any meaning in the lives of South Sudanese

Lately, Norway, the United Kingdom and the United States, commonly known as "Troika" in Sudan and South Sudan in the context of peace, have been talking...and talking...and talking...a lot. 

This has not always been the case. They have been, since the mid-1990s during the North-South war in Sudan, action-oriented  

Today, with embassies in Juba, all they do is issue ineffective press releases or statements. That is all. Necessarily diplomatic, yes. But what does that do for South Sudanese? Nothing.

For any change to materialize in South Sudan, the incumbent leadership must be subjected to something that would make it petrified. So far, nothing of the kind has been availed. Virtually nothing.

Targeted sanctions have not worked. Arms embargo has not worked. External pressure has not work. 

On July 3, 2026, Mr. Michael Adler, the US ambassador to Juba said words that continue to make me scratch my head. They make me scratch my head not because they are untrue. No. They make me shake my head because they have become platitudes. 

Here Ambassador Adler:

The topography of corruption: Mr. James Deng Wal Achien and lack of accountability and transparency in the multi-million dollar J1 construction project

By the Editor*

 

"On perusal, the process was not carried out in accordance with procedures prescribed by the Public Procurement and Disposal of Asset Act, 2018 by conducting competitive tendering so that value for money could be obtained and cost reduced." Moulana Filberto Mayuot Mareng, March 25, 2022 (letter)

Photo: Government of South Sudan

The construction at South Sudan's State House, commonly known as Juba One (J1), has resumed. "The J1 project," according to the office of the president, was "ordered back into motion by President Kiir after a high-level meeting with the Oversight Committee."  

This project is causing some concerns among some people in South Sudan because of lack of transparency. While the government departments and officials involved in the project between 2021 and 2026 are aware of the details, the South Sudanese public only knows there is a construction project at J1.

Given the importance of J1 to the South Sudanese sovereignty and nationhood, there are many questions the office of the president should answer for the sake of transparency and accountability. 

The documents

 Using documentary sources from a source whose identity will not be revealed here for security reasons, this article explains why the construction is causing some concerns. The documents were forwarded to me by a concerned South Sudanese living in Juba. Concerned about the possibility that "The J1 project"  is a front for the siphoning of public funds, the individual believes the public needs to know some details about the project and the people involved in it. 

I have reached out to the office of the president, the ministry of information and the some officials involved but I have not heard back from them. I will update this article should any details change. 

Issues of concern

There are a number of issues that should concern the public. It is of course up to the office of the president to address them transparently. Unfortunately, transparency and accountability are institutional requirements South Sudanese officials ignore or disdain. They are apparently beneath them. 

The first issue of concern is the nature of the contract between the office of the president and "Rams Civil Works and Engineering Consultant Ltd" (Here after RAMS), drafted on April 8th, 2022. 

Note that the company sometimes writes the name as "RAMS for Civil Work and Engineering Consultant Ltd." The reader should also not that this South Sudanese [RAMS] company should not be confused with RAM Civil Engineering, a Canadian company. I want to make that clear. 

Doc. 1

Is Adut Salva Kiir a proverbial wolf in a sheep's clothing?

President Salva (left) and Adut Salva Kiir (Right)

When Adut Salva Kiir was appointed President Kiir's special envoy for special programs in August of 2025, many of us received her appointment with high hope. We overlooked the nepotistic element. We had good reason. She promised to be different. What stood out for me was her promise to South Sudanese Gen Zs and all the voiceless South Sudanese.

 At the time Kenyan Gen Zs were protesting the high cost of living in Kenya.  She duly told South Sudanese young people that they had the right to express their grievances without fear of reprisal. That was the first time a high-ranking official had said something like that. Protests are taboo in South Sudan. For the powers that be, protests reek of revolution. 

But Adut appeared different, almost presidential. She pledged with that beguiling soft-spoken voice that she is

"representing those who served our nation. I'm representing the vulnerable. I'm representing those that have unspoken voices. I'm representing our fathers, their struggle. I'm representing a nation that had high hopes. And I don't take it lightly." 

How could one not like that?

There was good reason to hope that Adut would be strategically and politically different. She had lived in Australia, a relatively freer society, a society in which institutionalism and the rule of law are very accented. She appeared to know the value of reasonable disagreements and the logic of political and civil space. She even said she would have "an open-door policy. You can come to my office and I will listen." 

There is more. 

And more importantly, she said she was "open to criticism as well. I may not like it all, but I will take it in." 

It seemed like the dawn of a new day. But we were too optimistic.

Private reports and social media engagements by people very close to the first family and J1 informants are painting a different picture. Adut was only wearing a mask of amiability, of magnanimity. 

As things stand now, Adut, it seems, is no longer interested in service provision and national development. She wants to be Adut the wielder of unbridled power, an unaccountable power. 

She has been, apparently, sucked into power politics. She is no longer someone who is interested in changing South Sudan for better. She is interested in power as South Sudan's heiress apparent. 

Mabior Riiny Lual, a former MP in the South Sudan's transitional legislative assembly as an opposition figure, wrote on his Facebook account on May 25 that Adut was about to have herself decreed into office as Vice President for economic cluster and the first deputy chairperson of SPLM, the ruling party in South Sudan. 

This means she would replace Dr. James Wani Igga. Vice President Wani is now the first deputy chairperson of SPLM and the Vice President in charge of economic cluster.

This means the SPLM and the presidency would be led by father and daughter. But there seems to be an obstacle to her ascendancy. 

In my recent conversation with Mabior on KuirthiyTV, Mabior also mentioned that Adut is the one who does not want the former Vice President, Dr. Benjamin Bol Mel, to be released from detention. According to Mabior, Adut threatened to commit suicide if Dr. Bol Mel is released.

In South Sudan the problem is the system, not capacity or the character of the people.

Photo: ICRC Audio Visual Archives

The youth in South Sudan have no people-centered mentorship. As things stand now, they have been introduced to development-retarding systems of self-enrichment. The system is tribalist, militarist, elitist, and neo-patrimonial.  

This is paucity of leadership. In The Trouble With Nigeria, Chinua Achebe noted aptly that:

 "The trouble with Nigeria is simply and squarely a failure of leadership. There is nothing basically wrong with the Nigerian character. There is nothing wrong with the Nigerian land or climate or water or air or anything else. The Nigerian problem is the unwillingness or inability ofits leaders to rise to the responsibility, to the challenge of personal example which are the hallmarks of true leadership." 

What Achebe said of Nigeria is also true of South Sudan today. But South Sudan has excellent leaders, or potentially excellent leaders.

 The main challenge is that these leaders are not given the chance to show what they can do. Some have been fenced off completely from government positions. Others have been decreed into offices and then removed without enough time to operationalize their institutional agenda. 

The problem in South Sudan, therefore, is the system.

As I have stressed, and I have discussed this extensively with guests on KuirthiyTV, the problem in South Sudan is not lack of capacity, necessarily. The problem is lack of an institutional set-up that can make South Sudanese with skills show what they can provide in the context of state-building.  Lack of capacity is a short-term problem. 

A state that is serious about development and provision of services to the its people can make use of human capital within and outside the country. Provisionally, the government can hire experts from foreign countries to help with capacity building until the local work force is able to take over successfully and efficiently.

So capacity isn't the main problem. The paucity of leadership is the main problem. 

Those in charge of decision-making in the country see those with skills as threats. Governance and leadership has  become about what the elite can get not how the country and her people can benefit. 

This attitude has made vital institutions that make the country functional in the interest of the people virtually useless in South Sudan. The media is basically toothless. The parliament is either the president's rubber stamp, or it utterly ineffectual. The security sector has become a military wing of the ruling party, SPLM. It's political. And in some cases, it becomes tribalized. 

Such a system feeds avariciously on neo-patrimonialism and elitist reciprocity. Outside this system, no one matters. You either support this system or you look away from their entrenched siphoning of resources. 

It is therefore unnecessary for decision-makers to employ people with effective skills and a good moral compass; those who cannot give in to graft and corruption to advance their political and economic future.

Good leaders are disruptive to graft systems and neo-patrimonialism. What President Kiir  rationalizes as a search for the right person to fix the failure of the economy in South Sudan is rather a rejection of potential system disruptors. 

The problem in South Sudan is not only self-inflicted; it continues to be exacerbated by the very leaders who created it. 

What is tragic is that those who created this crisis do not suffer the consequences of their decisions, or indecisions. There is therefore no incentives for them to fix the economy, security and ethnic relations for South Sudan to prosper. 

The youth and the younger generation are therefore being introduced to a culture that will make changing the trajectory of development nearly impossible. 

____________________

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

South Sudan needs peace, reconciliation and healing - NOw

Photo: South Sudan Eagle Media

South Sudanese have not known peace. They've only known war. This is almost becoming the national culture. When they are not suffering from deadly, internecine ethnic feuds, then they are suffering from state brutalization or neglect.

Even the period after the 1972 Addis Ababa Peace Agreement, which was supposed to be peaceful, was not entirely so. The elite, instead of taking advantage of the relative autonomy in the interest of the people, they turned the regional government into a theatre of mindless elitism (see Elijah Malok's book) and ethnicized politics. Service provision became secondary.

Today, the government of the day has a chance. It has all the trappings of a conventional government, at least structurally speaking. Functionally, that is a different conversation.

But there is no denying that we are way passed the failed state stage. We are in an anarchic stage. There is no order. The massacre of Nuer civilians in Ayod, Northern Jonglei by the lawless, undisciplined SSPDF (who seem to have turned the national army into, largely, an ethnic army), the recent massacre of over 200 Jieeng civilians in Ruweng Administrative Area by armed Nuer youth from Unity State, and the recent inter-ethnic massacre of civilians in Terekeka in Central Equatoria, are examples of such anarchy.

Something must change!

A recent warning by Hon. Pagan Amum of Real-SPLM of the risk of genocide is tragically coming true. Things should not continue this way.

But there is no government in place, really. There is even no one in power. The recent categorization by Hon. Lual Dau of United People's Alliance of the four competing, anti-people centers of power is one illustration of such political anomie and lack of a genuine, people-centered power center. These power centers are all rent seekers, red in the face with graft and corruption!

What we have is power struggle. It's chaotic. But things look orderly and calm from the elite's perspective. Their photo-ops with foreign dignitaries give them the impression they are successful leaders engaged in state-building.

The powers that be in South Sudan are not affected. Their families are safe. They get money through informal, neo-patrimonial channels of clientelism. The recent mass of arrests wasn't an anti-corruption and anti-graft campaign. It was clientelism betrayed within the graft brotherhood and sisterhood. No honor among thieves, they say!

The majority is suffering. South Sudanese are slaves in their own country, worked for free by their own leaders. Liberators!

What South Sudan needs now is not needless ethnic divisiveness. What we need is a serious leadership to accept PEACE unconditionally; and then launch a HEALING and RECONCILIATION agenda.

We need a people-centered leadership who can travel the country, even at the risk of their lives, to reconcile the people.

South Sudan is a failed state, par excellence. It is now risking a total self-destruction as ethnic groups have no law and order structure and relations.

__________

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

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. 

 

Mabior Garang Mabior: Practice respect, humility and service to the people

Photo: Courtesy of Mabior Garang's Facebook account

I wish Mabior Garang Mabior luck in his new ministerial role. It's a trying role in a trying environment; but he seems prepared and skilled. That is the nature of the system in South Sudan.

But I have a message for Mabior. For those of you with long-writings-phobia, skip this. Do something better with your time!

I urge him to be a little humble. Being John Garang's son doesn't give him a special epistemic position or a socio-political weight above and beyond what the people are prepared to stomach. Twi supports him, Jonglei supports him, and South Sudan supports him. He's one voice, one mind. Let him remember that!

Meaning his ministerial stature after Kiir's decrees come knocking will depend not on being Garang's son. It will depend very much on what he achieves and how he treats people. Not people who pander to him but also those who disagree with him. We know his achievements aren't going to be many (if any) given the anomic system within which he's going to work in South Sudan.

However, being John Garang's son matters. While Mabior is revered for his wit and individual decisions he has made, making him apparently a man of his own, we cannot downplay the role of his larger-than-life father regarding how Mabior is perceived by the powers that be and by the lay public. Garang's Mabior's name opens doors, inspires respect and, sometimes, terror. This is not only the nature of human relations in South Sudan. Name recognition applies all over the world.

This also means being Garang's son should come with a considered and considerate responsibility. The sons and daughters of "no bodies" he is wont to make fun of on his Facebook comments and statuses are watching. They may not seem much to Mabior, but leadership necessitates that he perceives them, and respond to them, as amounting to more than he is willing to entertain. The average civilian in South Sudan expects this.

A question of principles. Mabior left President Kiir for Riek Machar's rebellion because of how President Kiir ran the system aground. Mabior was right. Yet he came back to the same Kiir when the country under president Kiir is in a much terrible state. He now, somehow obsequiously, supports President Kiir. What has changed? South Sudan is worse than when Mabior was Kiir's staunch critic.

Granted, political alliances change. Commonsense. But alliances should change with one's principles not majorly compromised. Otherwise, one risks becoming a political entrepreneur, making South Sudan what Achille Mbembe has called an economic system of reciprocity.

As a political leader of some import in South Sudan, Mabior should start providing answers, respectful and respectable answers, than his usual dismissive, abrasive slights. He carries the weight of a legacy, if not the legacy (with a capital "L") whether he likes it or not.

Humility. When Mabior told Mading Ngor of Terab Media that he didn't join Dr. Riek, that Dr. Riek joined him, I knew Mabior was an intellectual, his father's son. But the political implication of the statement left me scratching my head. I started to doubt his political humility in an ethnically diverse country.

While Mabior sounded political and witty, he was very arrogant in that statement. Mabior didn't form any formal political or rebel movement before the crisis of 2013 in South Sudan to say Dr. Riek Joined him.

Yes, his joining Dr. Riek was considered scandalous by the likes of Mading Ngor. Therefore, Mabior had to distance himself from Dr. Riek's legacy without distancing himself. It was a hard sell. It was a double-edged sword. It shows how less Mabior thinks of others, even political leaders with whom he agrees.

I admire Mabior’s intellect and eloquence. No doubt. He's also informed. He reads, unlike some "intellectuals" I know. I admire his drive. This is something the younger generation in South Sudan needs now. He can inspire.

But Mabior Garang has one problem. Hubris. I'm not sure if it is a personality issue or it is because he is Garang's son. Otherwise, Mabior needs to treat the sons and daughters of nobodies of South Sudan with respect and humility.

______

Kuir ë Garang (PhD) is the editor of TPR.

The Secession of Upper Nile Region: Brazen but not Ridiculous

 

By Kuir ë Garang (Editor)

Dr. Deng Bol Aruai. 

Photo: Courtesy of Dr. Deng Bol Aruai's Facebook Page

The proposal by Dr. Deng Bol Aruai (DBA) for the secession of the Upper Nile region from South Sudan is fascinating. It is neither ridiculous nor is it acceptable. It is a double-edge sword. Looked at carefully, one can find a silver lining in the proposition not only for Upper Nile but for South Sudan. I will come back to this silver lining.

How Dangerous?

But it can also be a very dangerous proposition. Meaning it can be used by power and ethnic entrepreneurs and megalomaniacs to create elite-centered, infra-national micro-states useful for resource control. The interest of such people is not freedom, democracy or the provision of services to the people. It is only the change of guards and the center of power.

This is what postcolonial African leaders did. They fought European colonial powers only to become the very colonial potentates and extractive politico-capitalists, quasi-foreigners subjecting their people to the same control structures. As Frantz Fanon has argued in The Wretched of the Earth, some freedom fighters were not fighting the oppressor for freedom; they were fighting the oppressor for a chance to be like the oppressor.

SPLM leaders, as many of us are aware, have done the same thing. They got rid of Khartoum’s elite only to assume the same oppressive and marginalizing governance modus operandi in Juba.

In other words, Dr. Deng’s proposal could provide a political, social and economic currency for those whose interest are small fiefdoms, some pseudo-feudal states they can control.

Because I have not talked to Deng Bol to ascertain the deeper social, political and economic issues behind his proposal, I want to be circumspect about assuming his motives. I will therefore leave my cautionary statement at that.

And I have not forgotten. Secessionist processes can be bloody and protracted.

Of course, Deng Bol is not ignorant of this. Political independence is never given away peacefully. Southern Sudan (Sudan), Katanga (DR Congo), Biafra (Nigeria), Taiwan (China), Tibet (China) and Western Sahara (Morocco) are good examples of how centers of powers can make even a peaceful quest for independence, even on sound grounds, bloody and terrifying.

A Chance for Reflection?

But the proposal can have a silver lining: A chance for a deeper reflective, reflexive process.  Why? People who want to protect the status quo usually treat revolutionary ideas with disdain. Trying to understand either the revolutionary proposal or the reason for which such proposals are suggested in the first place serves no purpose for them. Instant disdain and categorical rejections of such proposals are the first and only responses. Rationalizing or analyzing to find out their possible usefulness to them is a waste of time. Preposterous!

But why?

If the power structure benefits the powers that be as it is, they see no reason to change it.  “If it ain’t broke, why fix it,” as the Americans would say. That new ideas should be considered rationally and factually without being discarded a priori is still foreign to us. It should not be.

But in South Sudan, it is not only those in power who dismiss revolutionary ideas before they are considered thoroughly. Even those who have been left utterly destitute and despondent by a broken, rotten system in South Sudan still protect it, astonishingly. These are the people unashamedly calling Deng Bol names.

What we have failed to learn, and I am not sure why some of us learn it and others have not, is that you don’t have to accept a given proposal for you to treat it with the respect it deserves. Before one dismisses and administrative or political proposal, it is prudent, even professional, to consider its merits and flaws before rejecting it.

Considering the merits and flaws of any revolutionary (read bizarre) does not make you beholden to its acceptance. It only shows that your leadership is mature, sophisticated and resistant to superficialities.

Calling Deng Bol names or considering his mobility issues pre-conditions for national leadership only reflects the depravity of our society. We can reject Deng’s proposal without descending into needless emotional paroxysm draped in ableist nonsense. We can rubbish his ideas (not him ad hominem) by asking him to provide political, economic and social justification for his proposal, brazen as it appears to many of us.

Rejecting the Proposal

I reject Deng’s proposal for the same reason I reject ethnic federalism. That Bahr El Ghazal is the problem is either a wilful disinformation, because I do not think Deng Bol can be misinformed about the suffering in Bahr El Ghazal, or he is using it as a negotiation instrument not for himself but to force President Kiir and members of his court (in a European medieval sense) to pay attention: That the country may disintegrate.

For all the king’s courtiers to stick their heads in the mud thinking that everything is business as usual would have to be abandoned. If they realize Deng’s proposal is only a tip of a gigantic socio-political ice-berg, that is.

There is a Movement in the Equatorias for secession. There is also a campaign by some Nuer for independence of Nuer Nation (Rol Naath). The presence of administrative areas such as Ruweng and Pibor is symptomatic of secessionist sentiments writ small. These are all about discontent with someone or with some maladministration of some authority.

Before once dismisses Deng’s proposal mindlessly, one needs to ask oneself: What has motivated Deng to propose such a radical idea? The “why?” matters more than what happened or what is proposed. We also need to remember that “normal” ideas have never brought any change. Radical ideas, which become “normal” with time, bring about change. Think about all revolutionaries! How normal were their ideas?

But Deng knows very well that Upper Nile, Bahr El Ghazal and Equatoria have their internal problems. The moment the scapegoat has escaped, the internal scapegoat is created. While I agree the departure of President Kiir and some of the men around him may usher in a possible change in our political culture, I think secession breeds other problems. Some of the people destroying South Sudan around President Kiir are from Upper Nile. What would we do with them once we secede?

There is therefore no guarantee that Upper Nile as a sovereign state would be any peaceful and developed. What has sons and daughters of Upper Nile done so far in their own states, counties and bomas? Do they have existing social, political and economic practices that can be considered prototypes of a prosperous sovereign state writ small? No! Is it coincidental that all administrative areas are in Upper Nile? No! Internal discontent!

Is Dr. Deng showing promising signs of what Gregory Burns calls a transformative, moral leadership? No! Is there transparency in Deng’s initiative? No! In fact, Deng has already started to use “decrees”, a bad sign from the beginning for democracy.

But as much as I think Deng Bol’s proposal is wrong-headed, I also believe Deng is making us rethink some of the issues we take for granted. That is the silver lining. People should not belong to the same country just because we think it is right, normative. They should belong in the same country because all the elements that make one feel like what Philosopher Robert Paul Wolff calls “a full citizen” exist.

What does this mean then?

Let us learn the art of entertaining ideas we don’t like before we reject them. Ideas are not wrong because we don’t like them or because they come from people we don’t like.

The Message

Here is my main message. As a country of diverse ethnic groups and political opinions, let’s get used to the idea that citizens can table proposals, any bizarre or ridiculous ideas, regarding how the country should be governed. We don’t have to accept them. But we must consider them as ideas coming from fellow citizens.

Dismissing ideas a priori is a luxury of petulant children or those who status quo is profitable. As Machiavelli has argued in The Prince, those who are used to immoral governance methods that benefit them see no reason for change

Taken with a more philosophical and political grain of salt, Deng’s proposal is neither bad nor is it good. Its results, positive or negative, depends on who operationalizes it.

We can reject it but still use it to reflect deeply on the state of affair. Or we can use it to think about alternative forms of government. Hasn’t federalism, or decentralization as some politely call it, been the popular demands of the people of South Sudan since the 1950s? Wasn’t confederation one of John Garang’s administrative proposals?

Who governs us is irrelevant. How they govern is all that matters.

______________________

Kuir ë Garang (PhD) is the editor of the TPR. 

Youth Marginality and Marginalization: A conversation on the Crisis facing South Sudanese youth in Australia

Kuir  ë Garang (Editor)

 

Photo: Refugeeresearchonline.org

September 20, 2025

The following quotes are from my conversation with Dr. William Abur and Dr. Santino A. Deng. 

"You know, there's no any child that can be born as a bad child, for example. No, a child can be a difficult child...based on where the child is raised, based on the environment, based on the family situation, based on the school, based on the community, what the children do. So now with this current climate of the technology, some of the parents don't even know what the kids are doing as Dr. Santino mentioned it before. They can be in a room and the parents are happy. saying, well, my children are inside, they are not out. But they don't know what they are doing, who are the people that they are engaged with. And that is a bigger issue within a number of families. The conversations also don't break through. You know, the relationship between the young person and the parent, when that relationship is broken, it is hard for the parent to be able to play their role.

 The other burden that the parent are facing, most of the parent are struggling with work and the life generally. So they don't have enough time where they can be able to engage with their kid and especially with a teenager to be able to find out how they are going, you know, what is happening. Because it is important, we human being, need check-in. We need check-in to be...

 For example, children, those teenagers or younger children, they need check-in, you know, someone to come and have a conversation with them and say, hey, how did you go at school? How was the day? How did you go at work? How was your day? Those kind of check-in are very important. Psychologically, they are very useful. And this is where you find out that, okay, the person may be open up to talk about, you know, there was incident that happened at school.

 Or there was this that happened that made me upset. That is lacking that conversation. The basic check in. I would say the parent need to step up to be able to do just a simple check in a simple evaluation to check in your kit. Even though they are inside, you need to be able to knock knock at the door and come in and say hey, how is your day? How are you going?"  ~ Dr. William Abur.

 

~ Dr. William Abur.

"I think when we talk of parents, there are a lot that they can do and I am mindful and I understand that some parents might be struggling with other things, language barriers among others and the web, juggling web and so on. And sometimes being maybe some single mothers is really struggling with, you know, with the primary parenting support and trying to put the put on the table as well. But there are a lot that they can do. I have done some work a few years ago, maybe about seven years ago here in one of the school. And I was asked to do some work with a kind of the children that go to school, young people themselves and teachers in school so that I can get their perspective.

 It was one of the schools that was getting overwhelmed and have never been exposed into diversity before. And what came out of that report that I did was a lot of young people were saying, some of the things that I was mentioning earlier, saying that most of the time when they have issues at a school, they report to the teachers, most of the time they're getting ignored, even sometimes.

they get blamed for being the victim. so what happens sometimes they may end up fighting, taking law into their own hand because nobody is actually responding to their complaint and they become more victim and get expelled. Sometimes they get discouraged and told, you can't do this subject. Actually, William know very well that they work in some school here, maybe told that, this is too hard for you, you can't do it.

 Some parents proved some of their teachers wrong and said, I have to do it or go into another school and actually succeed. Some young people, may give in, but support become very crucial. I came across some example where young people were supported by their parents and some relatives and they actually succeed in so many ways. So what they told me was young people in particular."  ~ Dr. Santino A. Deng

                                                          ~ Dr. Santino A. Deng

 

Most immigrant communities face a host of challenges when they settle in a new countries. This is a historical problem. Meaning South Sudanese in Australia are not the only immigrant and refugee group to be in such a situation. South Sudanese in Canada have faced, and continue to experience,  similar problems among the youth. 

These problems, which Dr. William and Dr. Santino have addressed, include the following: 

1. Being neglected by teachers and school administrators
2. Being faulted when they are not at fault
3. Stereotypes and prejudgments
4. Racist treatment by the police
5. Overrepresentation in the criminal justice system
6. Cultural disconnect between home culture and host culture
7. Lack of appropriate, community role models
8. Lack of parental attention due to pressure from work and life
9. Misconstrual of what it means to be an Australia, Canadian or American
10. Incentivization from gangs and criminal to run criminal errands

Youth workers and scholars who study youth issues are familiar with these issues. They are characterized by overt and subtle issues of social marginalization and institutional neglect. 

On Sunday, I had a conversation with two South Sudanese Australian researchers as the beginning of what I think will be a protracted conversation. 

I wanted to unpack these problems from the perspective of researchers and from the Australian context. These researchers are Dr. William Abur, a lecturer at the University of Melbourne and Dr. Santino A. Deng, a researcher working for the government of Victoria, Australia. 

I asked them to lay out the issues within the Australian context, and to propose possible expert solutions. 

The following is our conversation.

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Kuir  ë Garang (PhD) is the editor of TPR. Follow me on X: @kuirthiy Instagram: @Kuirthiy