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.

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.

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

Dr. Jok Madut and Dr. Aldo Ajou say Bol Mel is not President Kiir’s heir apparent

 

Dr. Jok Madut (left), Dr. Bol Mel (middle) and Dr. Aldo Ajou Deng (right)

The social media statements by Dr. Jok Madut and Dr. Uncle Aldo Ajou are confusing. I think they will have to explain the following to South Sudanese.

Dr. Jok said that what is being discussed about Bol Mel is based on assumptions and hatred of the man. He also said that Bol Mel has not expressed any desire to replace Kiir. And that Kiir has not said he's preparing Bol Mel to replace him. I will give Dr. Jok the benefit of the doubt because he shared these views on social media where most of us are not always serious and measured when sharing our views.  

I have come to know Dr. Jok as far more sophisticated and self-aware than the status being referenced reveals.

Here is my dilemma. I’m not sure if Jok is saying that for us to accept the argument that Bol Mel regards himself as the heir apparent to President Kiir then he must say explicitly, "I want to replace President Kiir!"?

I will wait for Dr. Jok to explain himself. Bol Mel will have to be a complete dodo to say publicly he will replace President Kiir!

No!

Bol Mel has shown a meticulous ruthlessness, a systematicity of a miskiin sekin! The English calls such a person a silent killer.

Also, there is never a case where politicians are clear about their intentions. Facts and politicians are like Trump and Truth, water and oil!

Since Bol Mel was decreed in, he's been like Kiir's right-hand man. He stood beside President Kiir when the man from Kampala came to South Sudan. He was the one sent to Ethiopia to smooth things over with the New Flower [Addis Ababa] after J1 prioritized the man from Kampala over Dr. Abiy Ahmed of Ethiopia.

When he was appointed VP, Bol verbally, explicitly targeted Riek Machar, a member of the presidency. He also asked Madam Nyandeeng not to abandon Kiir! I'm not sure what he meant by that! He also mentioned that he would get involved in security issues. We must ask ourselves why?

Now, Riek is in detention and Upper Nile and Jonglei are conflagrations. That Bol Mel may be Kiir's successor is more of a presumption than an assumption. Enter Bol Mel as VP and boom! there is money for salary! This is what late Steve Jobs called connecting "the dots moving backwards."

How about Uncle Dr. Aldo?

He said Kiir cannot just make Bol Mel his successor, arguing that SPLM has succession structures. He's kidding, right?

Is it not the same Kiir who embarrassed Kuol Manyang, imposed Peter Lam Both and then tossed him, demoted Wani Igga to Secretary General and then made Bol Mel one of the deputy chairs of the SPLM? Did anyone in the SPLM make a whimpering sound?

Note this. If the president goes abroad for state visits, article 1.6 section 1.6.4 of the Revitalized Peace Agreement says that the first vice president becomes the acting president on a temporary basis. When both the president and the first vice president are absent, the president appoint one of the four vice presidents as acting president.  

Since Riek is now in detention, let’s see who President Kiir would appoint as acting president. Vice President Nyandeeng? Vice President Josephine Lagu? Vice president Taban Deng Gai?

We will see…

Note that section 1.6.5 says that if the president is mentally or physically incapacitated then the next president will be selected by the party of the president. Dr. Riek cannot become president through the revitalized agreement of 2018. Perhaps Uncle Doctor has a point here. If SPLM leaders are no longer afraid of Kiir then they may ignore his wishes and pretend SPLM has structures to respect.

But Kiir is, we are told, not physically and mentally incapacitated now. When it comes to succession, please don’t try Kiir! Try Kiir...just try...!

So Uncle Aldo is saying Kiir will, somehow, respect rules, laws and regulations when it comes to who is to succeed him? Come on Uncle Doctor! Has anyone ever defied Kiir? Pagan, Nyandeeng and Riek did! Where are they now? Madam Nyandeeng is protected by the ghost and the liberation aura of John Garang. She became VP through G [X] not through Kiir’s SPLM.

Uncle Doctor also said that we cannot blame Bol Mel for the corruption inherent in awarding contracts. Bol Mel is just a businessman, he said. Is this an implicit endorsement of corruption?

So Bol Mel is our VP but we should not hold him legally and morally accountable? Is that what we are now supposed to expect from our public officials? "Blame the government! I knew there was corruption but what did you expect me to do?"

Folks, Bol Mel is a public figure, for better or for worse. Allow us to unpack his public life! He comes with violence and money…and the slick, efficient smoothness of a high-end gigolo!


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

A tribe called SPLA masquerading as South Sudanese

First Vice President Riek Machar and President Salva Kiir Mayardit

____

I know President Kiir, most of the time, says the RIGHT thing but does the WRONG thing. While he can incite tribalism sometimes, he tends to sound like a leader once in a while. Check his Independence Day speech. At times he says the right thing to the people of South Sudan.

His actions, however, are most of the time contrary to what could be called leadership.

But credit where due. His call for calm is the right thing at the moment. I have been saying this over the last two decades: that President Kiir should always come out and address the country anytime there is a national tragedy and speak to the people of South Sudan.

There is something calming about words from the head of state. Leadership is a psycho-social reality.

Honorable Michael Makuei, the Minister of Information and the government spokesperson, calms no one down. Well, maybe a few South Sudanese find his condescending press statements calming. South Sudan is a country bereft of leadership. 

He talks with a princely I-will-say-what-I-want-so-what-the-hell-will-you-do-about-it attitude.

On the other hand, folks from Sudan People Liberation Movement In Opposition (SPLM-IO), that is, their spokespeople, talk like there is a gun to their heads. But they have this impotent, annoying, self-righteous attitude like they own THE truth. Like Truth=IO! They make me want to...forget it!

What South Sudanese do not have are leaders who speak on their behalf, leaders who care about South Sudan and her peoples.

But note that Uncle Makuei is neither Jieeng (Dinka) nor is he South Sudanese. He is from a tribe called the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA). This tribe has different clans. The largest two clans are "In-Government" and "In-Opposition."  Bɛny (1) Kiir are Kuär (2) Riek are their tribal chiefs, respectively. 

SPLA is a tribe that lives in the past. The future scares it. It is a tribe that does not apologize. It considers humility a defeat. It does not entertain criticism. Criticism is disrespectful to this tribe. It considers itself infallible. These people do not take responsibility for their actions.

They only like to point their crooked fingers.

But it is a tribe that is internally divided. SPLA as tribal people have used division to recruit two clueless colonies: Jieeng and Nuer. SPLA has so mentally colonized these two nations that they believe that members of SPLA are their fellow tribesfolk.

But President Kiir, once in a while, acts like a true South Sudanese, not a colonialist. He abandons the egregious, insidious values of his SPLA tribefolk every now and then.

Today, he acted like members of his colony: South Sudanese. But you can see in the same speech that his SPLA tribal attitude jumps out of him once in a while: He points fingers at "enemy of peace", who are, strangely, his SPLA folks and the folks SPLA has mentally colonized.

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

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Notes

1. Bɛny is a Jieeng word for a leader

2. Kuär is a Nuer word for a leaders.

Is SPLM-IO Becoming Politically Irrelevant?

Left: President Kiir; Right: VP, Dr. Riek Machar

By Kuir ë Garang

What I have noticed about Dr. Riek Machar is that he believes if he sticks to the truth and facts, then things will work out well. For some strange reasons, he has internalized this morally necessary but politically unpalatable reality. For a politician, this is odd, and very much so. He has been pushing this narrative now for well over a decade, that the world would side with him because he says the truth and President Kiir does not. But as he very well knows, truth in politics is a casualty of political schemes, interests and hypocrisies.

This does not mean there is no such a thing as truth or that truth does not matter. The issue is this: Truth, yes; but cui bono, who benefits?

Since August 17, 2015, when President Kiir and Dr. Riek Machar signed the agreement for the resolution of conflict in South Sudan (ARCISS) and then revitalized it on September 12, 2018, Dr. Riek Machar labored under the bewildering assumption that President Kiir will implement the agreement as stipulated in all its provisions. He also believes that if President Kiir does not implement the agreement, then peace partners and mediators will force him to ensure that all the provisions of the agreement are implemented.

This is a strange state of mind in politics, especially in countries Stuart Hall has described as complexly structured societies. I can say South Sudan is one of them.

President Kiir has shown time and again that he is either not interested in implementing the agreement or he does not know how to implement the agreement. This is a warranted presumption. Why Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-in-Opposition (SPLM-IO) still believes that President Kiir will change and implement the agreement is beyond me.

SPLM-IO has no political leverage. They only believe that truth and facts are on their side and that regional leaders will see who is at fault. But Kiir is the president so how regional leaders approach him is not as a subordinate or someone they can force to accept their punitive dictates.

This is something SPLM-IO must understand. Hear this again: They cannot, and will not, force Kiir’s hand! He is their colleague even when they at times act condescendingly toward him. IGAD leaders tried threatening Kiir like an infant in 2015. We know what happened.

If President Kiir must change, then that condition of change must be a political leverage Dr. Riek and SPLM-IO develop, either within the region or within the country. The agreement itself is not a leverage, but SPLM-IO believes it is.  The case of the Tumaini Initiative is a good example. It shows they neither have political leverage nor are they taken seriously in the region.

Running to mediators and regional leaders regularly to share grievances and the contravention of the agreement by President Kiir will only prove to Kiir that you are politically impotent and potentially becoming irrelevant. When regional leaders share Riek’s grievances with Kiir as casual advisories among colleagues, then any chance of Kiir taking you seriously dwindles with time.

Mediators and regional leaders can only urge the parties to the agreement to work toward the implementation of the agreement. That is all they can do. The people of South Sudan suffer when the agreements are not implemented; but President Kiir does not. He suffers no disincentive when he runs SPLM and ARCISS through the mud. As a frustrated former Ethiopian Prime minister, Hailemariam Desalegn, once said about the South Sudanese peace talks in Addis Ababa in 2015, the peace process had become meta-talks, talks about talks, not talks about peace.

SPLM-IO and Dr. Riek must find a way, through their own internal political mechanics, to force President Kiir to implement the agreement. No one outside Juba will do that. When President Kiir removed the minister of defense, Angelina Teny, on March 3, 2023, all SPLM-IO could do was share their displeasure and disenchantment with his actions. That was all.

It is time to realize that SPLM-IO political relevance in South Sudan should no longer be through the revitalized peace agreement. It must grow as a political entity. This is time for a political make-over. Even when we all know SPLM-IO is not necessarily on the wrong about ARCISS, and we know that facts and truth are on their side, being doggedly fixated on R-ARCISS is a dangerous political naivete. SPLM-IO’s long-term relevance should be through an institutionalized, coherent platform as a political party. That is the future, and that is the future of South Sudan. If Riek has no political leverage against Kiir, and facts to this date show he does not, and if regional leaders only convey advisories to Kiir, then it is time for Riek to change course. Political and strategic monotony is a sure path to political oblivion.

SPLM risk becoming, or it has already become, politically irrelevant. Unless of course being in government and occupying functionless, but fat government positions is how SPLM-IO wants to remain politically relevant in perpetuity.

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Kuir ë Garang (PhD), is the editor of The Philosophical Refugee. Twitter/X: @kuirthiy

 

Sovereignty as Responsibility

 

Sovereignty as responsibility

"My house is still under water. There are a lot of snakes and reptiles. The place is still a river; it's no longer a home. So how can I go back." Nyawal Makuei speaking to Aljazeera.

This, as you may have noticed from Nyawal's recollection about her state of despair, is about state responsibility to its citizens. 

In 1996, Dr. Francis Mading Deng, who was the United Nations Special Adviser for the Prevention of Genocide between May 29^th, 2007 and July 17, 2012, published a book, Sovereignty as Responsibility: Conflict Management in Africa, with Sadikiel Kimaro, Terrence Lyons, Donald Rothchild, and I. William Zartman through The Brookings Institution. 

So, what is sovereignty as responsibility? Here is Dr. Francis Mading Deng explaining what sovereignty as responsibility is.

Dr. Francis Mading Deng. 
Photo: Sudan Tribune

Dr. Francis Mading Deng: 

"The idea was to tell governments,  I realize this is an internal matter; it falls under your sovereignty. I'm respectful of your sovereignty, but I don't see sovereignty as a negative concept. I see it as a positive concept of a state responsibility for its people. If needs be with the help of the international community." 

So, what does this mean in the context of the South Sudanese state and its responsibility to its citizens? Did the South Sudanese government and its leaders consider sovereignty as responsibility, or have they rationalized it as power to intimidate civilians, enrich themselves with state resources, and terrorize critics however factually accurate these critics are regarding the situation.

To answer this question, let’s go back July 2011. What did South Sudanese leaders think and what did citizens feel? Here’s a glimpse. 

Aljazeera Report: 

"A nation is born, a symbol of sovereignty and identity flies for the first time. It's seen in South Sudan as nothing less than electric. Hundred of thousands of people converge in Juba, the world's newest capital city. They celebrated their long-waited independence marked by two civil wars over five decades, and countless lives lost."

The people were, understandably, ecstatic!  For the leaders, at the time, understood the challenge they face. But they promised to lead, provide for the citizens and prove South Sudanese, distractors, according to President Kiir, wrong. 

South Sudan's President, Salva Kiir Mayardit.

Here is President Kiir on July 9^th, 2011.

“My Dear compatriots South Sudanese, the eyes of the world are on us.

Our well-wishers including those who are now sharing with us the joy of this tremendous event will be watching closely to see if our very first steps in nationhood are steady and confident. They will surely want to see us as a worthwhile member of the international community by shunning policies that may draw us into confrontation with others.

They will be happy to see us succeed economically and want us to enjoy political stability. What this means is that the responsibilities of South Sudan will now be accentuated more than ever before, requiring that we rise to the challenge accordingly. It is my ardent belief that you are aware that our detractors have already written us off, even before the proclamation of our independence. They say we will slip into civil war as soon as our flag is hoisted. They justify that by arguing we are incapable of resolving our problems through dialogue. They charge that we are quick to revert to violence. They claim that our concept of democracy and freedom is faulty. It is incumbent upon us to prove them all wrong!”

What happened two years later is something for which I’m not going to remind you by way of explanation. Sovereignty became a quest for power rather than a responsibility to citizens.

Aljazeera's Report: 

"This used to be a road until it disappeared under water mid-last year. Now, the only way to get around in this part of South Sudan is by boats and canoes. It's the worst flood this region has seen in sixty years. In this areas, every home is abandoned. Families had no choice but to leave."  

Flood is obviously a naturally phenomenon. South Sudanese leaders did not cause it. But they have a responsibility to support civilians that have been displaced by the flood. They have failed. But that is not all. 

Here is John Kuok suffering from what President Kiir said would not happen. It seems like the distractors, sadly, have been proven right.

John Kuok, an internally displaced person, speaking to Aljazeera:

"It was no only 2013 where out colleagues and my brother were killed. Even during the struggle [against Khartoum] my brothers were also killed. So, when it repeated itself, it was horrible."

Ccontrary to President Kiir’s assurance on Independence Day: South Sudanese were “quick to revert to violence.”

However, Crises are everywhere. The main problem is their inability to solve problems, and their penchant for the abdication of state responsibility.

Here is South Sudan’s minister of information and the government spokesperson, Michael Makuei, about the challenges facing South Sudan’s peace partners regarding the integration of government and the opposition armies as stipulated in the revitalized agreement for the resolution of conflict in South Sudan.

Michael Makuei to VOA: 

"I said this agreement was never to be implemented, because, I said, the international community that supported us and gave us he assurances that. 'you sign this agreement; we will stand with you, and we will implement it with you. Just immediately after the signature, they sad back, and began to tell us, 'you implement it. You must be seen to be moving.' We asked them as said by my colleague, Stephen...we asked them to come for our support. Only very few friendly countries managed to do something for us." 

But here is Francis Mading, reminding governments about their responsibility to citizens.

"[Sovereignty as responsibility] also meant the responsibility had to be apportioned or reapportioned. Instead of depending on the supper powers, the states had to assume their responsibility for managing their situation. If they need help to call on the international community to help; and only in extreme cases where there is large suffering, massive amount of suffering and death.

There is no doubt that South Sudan still faces enormous challenges 12 years after independence. My advice to South Sudanese leaders is to prioritize the interest of citizens and regard sovereignty as responsibility bestowed on them by (1) the referendum votes; (2) the suffering of our people by fifty years of the liberation struggle, and (3) by the blood of those who died in the liberation struggle.

______________________

Kuir ë Garang

 

South Sudan's Dr. Riek Machar Reportedly in Khartoum for "Medical Treatment"

Photo credit: gurtong.com

Following reports by the United Nations on August 17th that United Missions in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUSCO) has extracted South Sudan's opposition leader and former First Vice President, Riek Machar, from the South Sudan-Congolese border on humanitarian grounds, Sudanese authorities have now confirmed that Machar is Khartoum for medical treatment.

Given the volatile relations between Juba and Khartoum, it was therefore imperative for the Sudanese officials to inform Juba that their reception of Dr. Machar was purely on 'humanitarian grounds.' From the pictures being circulated on social media, it's now apparent that Machar is in a very bad  shape medically.

Dr. Machar fled Juba at the beginning of the July following the resumption of fighting between his body guards and the president's body guards. While it isn't clear what happened on July 8th, the two parties have been accusing one another of having started the fighting. Machar claims he fled Juba fearing for his life while the government claims Machar was plotting to either kill the president or stage a coup. None of both claims have been independently verified.

Soon after Machar left Juba, Taban Deng Gai, the then SPLM-IO chief negotiator, was selected by IO officials in Juba to replace Machar 'temporarily' as both the IO leader and the First Vice President (FVP) until he [Machar] returns to Juba. Given the fact that Taban has changed his rhetoric, it's not clear if Machar will ever be allowed to assume his position as the FVP.

In his new capacity as the FVP of South Sudan, Taban toured Kenya and Sudan and called for Machar to 'renounce violence' and return to South Sudan as an average South Sudanese and wait for elections in 2018.

Since the reports of Machar having been killed turned out to be untrue and Taban not likely to relinquish his position, it's not clear what will happen when Machar gets better.