The Nation Burns as the SPLM leadership Drinks the Blood of the Suffering Citizens


I scaled down writing political commentaries because I believe that one can only criticize people who have the hearts and minds to change; people who look at criticisms and analyze their performances to improve institutional functions. Unfortunately, there’s only one thing the SPLM has done very well: the destruction of the country. What the Portuguese did in Mozambique in the 1970s when they left, is like what South Sudanese leaders are doing to the country. These men and women are looting, destroying and ruling as if they will leave tomorrow for ‘their real’ country.

The saddest thing about South Sudan now is that it has become a private property of gluttonous, incompetent and soulless men, who don’t care about the average South Sudanese. Our civil population dies or flees, goes hungry, but these men and women care less as long as they have their bloody dollars to spend on their mansions, villas and gargantuan SUVs in foreign countries.

Recently, we learned through a parliamentary committee report that the government of South Sudan doesn’t keep the oil money in the Central Bank. Do we have to wonder who’s to blame? But who’s surprised, really? The ministry of Finance and Economic Planning officials, the looting engine of the SPLM leadership, lost their moral and human souls when they saw and smelt the mighty dollar!  Not only is this destructive to the average hard-working South Sudanese, who needs hard currency, it also shows the callous extent to which Juba leaders would go to make sure that South Sudan is burnt to the ground. And there’s no end in sight as these callous, clueless and kleptomaniacs continue to burn what’s left of South Sudan to ashes. And the man, who’s supposed to be the guiding soul of the country, makes light of the fact that over 2 million South Sudanese are living outside the country as another 2 million languish in disease, hunger, insecurity, and death.

The SPLM-IG is a bunch of sheep led by a man who knows not his right hand from his left hand as he’s fed delicious food by selfish, gluttonous and blind supporters, who’d go to any extent to keep this man happy and clueless. SPLM-IO is another bunch of hopeless, structureless, leaderless bunch, who have no strategy to win anything except the fact that they oppose a rotten regime. They sing ‘winning and viva’ as if victories will descend to them from heaven in a divine fanfare. Their directionless rebellion, like the mess in Juba, is prolonging the suffering of the citizens.


Other opposition groups outside these two ruinous SPLM halves are a bunch of self-righteous men who only want to oppose without any tangible alternatives in terms of policy.

How did men and women who spent the prime of their lives fighting for the liberation of the country become such monsters? How did the then jewel of the liberation become the drinkers of the blood of the southern woman, man, and child? How did the African wisdom shun such men as they grow older?

SPLM is basically without a shred of caring leadership. How can a nation that prided in producing strong-hearted men who stood up for the rights of the African Person in the Sudan since the 1940s, produce such fat, clueless and callous men who continue to kill the very people the likes of Lolik Lado, Chan de Bilkuei, Both Diu, among others, spoke up for or fought to liberate?

No sane human being would say that he’s doing something positive when more than a third of the civil population has fled the country? South Sudanese citizens are being abused, insulted and mistreated now in Sudan as refugees. What’s different between a foreigner ruling South Sudan and the government of Kiir Mayardit? South Sudan has been destroyed in a manner we’ve never seen before. As our people suffer, there are still blind and greedy supporters, who still believe that ‘President Kiir is doing his best.’ How did we become such immoral as to see death of our own as normal? How did we become people who put pride in leaders before human lives?

It’s been twelve years since the SPLM took over the leadership in Juba. And it has been twelve horrible years on our people. No matter how untouchable and powerful this President thinks he is, he should know that the blood and the cries of our people will haunt him forever! No leadership lasts forever. Girls and boys as young as nine are begging in the streets and markets in Aweil, Juba, Torit, Wau and other major towns. Looting and killing in Juba is a daily occurrence. Except for Juba, in relative terms, the rest of the country is a wasteland the SPLM doesn’t bother to think about! Yet, the morally-challenged lot still believe ‘everything is okay.”

SPLM should know that peace is not easy, but it's valuable for national development. Nations don't develop when they are at war. The only way President Kiir can get rid of the specter of the lost souls that'd HAUNT him to his grave is to bring peace. John Garang made peace with the Nasir Doctors [Lam Akol and Riek Machar] not because he liked or trusted them, but because such an initiative was necessary for the unity of the South. No matter how incompetent a leader is, the suffering of the people should be something he or she should always pay attention to with humane eyes!

Follow me on twitter @Kuirthiy


The Juba Republic: South Sudan Reduced to a CITY STATE

Photo: UN.ORG
South Sudan is beyond the question of whether or not it is a FAILED STATE. It is, unequivocally, a Failed State; and it would soon collapse completely if nothing is done by the regional leaders and other well-wishers. The then promising new country in the Nile Valley has been reduced to a City State. There is no order in South Sudan and there is no South Sudan as a cohesive state. There’s only the Lawless Republic of Juba. Even at the suburbs of Juba, lawlessness reigns infinitely. In the countryside and in other towns, people are living in a different, disjointed universe: Death, Famine, Insecurity, Diseases, Hopelessness…

Humanitarian agencies now say that about 1.4 billion dollars is required to help South Sudanese civilians. Over 3 million people have been displaced and many more face starvation as relief workers cannot reach them because of impassable roads or insecurity. The UNICEF recently reported that over 70% of school-aged children aren’t in school. So, not only has South Sudan’s present being destroyed, her future is already under complete destruction.

Towns in South Sudan are disconnected by impassable roads, insecurity and targeted tribal killings. Still, despondent civilians brave death on these insecure roads as they flee fighting. David Shearer, the head of UN Mission in South Sudan, recently said “that Government forces are now approaching the town of Maiwut, 25 kilometres north-west of Pagak. I’m gravely concerned by this ongoing situation.” This is sad because President Kiir, during his speech on the 6th anniversary of South Sudan’s independence, declared a ‘unilateral ceasefire’ and emphasised the need for the National Dialogue, which he created in December last year.  As Juba talks peace and ND, it continues to pursue war, thereby prolonging the suffering of the people.

When South Sudanese officials say that ‘things are calm in the country,’ they mean that things are calm in Juba. As long as Juba is safe, then everything is presumably okay. Even when you get reports of 40 people dying of hunger in Amadi State, things are still considered okay and no condolence messages go to the affect families. These people died of hunger because they’d fled their homes due to insecurity in the area as a result of the fighting between government’s and rebel’s forces.  And around the town of Torit in Imatong State, over 250 orphans were caught in the battle between the warring parties and the UN had to ask the warring parties to give UN officials some access to evacuate the orphans.

There is no longer a country called South Sudan because everything the leadership in Juba is doing is to safeguard the security of Juba not the security of South Sudan. The leadership in South Sudan is confined to the capital with the least interest in the welfare of civilians in other parts of the country.

Unless the African Union comes out strongly with sticks and carrot methodical action, South Sudan would soon be a collection of small tribal states that are belligerent to one another. It would indeed take time and money to make South Sudan a viable state again if nothing urgent is done. The AU, IGAD and the Troika countries [Norway, UK & USA] are watching the horrible happen and not doing much. The country has been reduced to a mere City State as civilians suffer or flee. 

The City State is taking care of itself and its elitist rulers. But then there is no end in sight. 

While some opposition forces are calling for the revitalization of the Agreement for the Resolution of the Conflict in South Sudan (ARCISS), others are calling for a completely different political process to bring peace to the country as they consider ARCISS to have collapsed.

There is no leadership in Juba but madness. Recently the president sacked 12 judges because they were striking in favour of the judicial reforms, [two months'] pay and the living conditions. Speaking against the dismissed judges, Akol Paul Kordit, the deputy minister of information, sadly said that “These judges, who were supposed to deliver justice obstructed justice themselves. They denied [sic] our people justice for reasons that could be resolved through administrative channels.” Considering the fact that these judges have not been paid for 2 months, the minister's charges are ridiculous. This is the classic victimisation of the victim.

And regarding the July 9th declaration of the cease-fire by the president, the minister of information, Michael Makuei, argued that the ceasefire excludes the rebels under the former Vice President, Riek Machar. The minister knows very well that such actions lead to increased suffering of civilians.

People have nothing to eat; they cannot travel because of insecurity; the pay doesn’t come for months and when it comes, it cannot buy anything because of nearly 1000% inflation; people cannot speak up for fear of reprisal; there is no national cohesion; different tribes are killing one another daily; officials don’t visit the suffering civilians; and the president hardly leaves Juba unless he’s traveling abroad.

The situation is grim and we are watching it unfold. After Rwanda, the world said, ‘not again!’ But it’s happening again in South Sudan. The once promising state in the Nile Valley is not only now the abode of insecurity and suffering, it has been reduced to the area around the vicinity of its capital.

Follow the author on Twitter @kuirthiy 




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