Who will save Government of South Sudan from wrong turn?
By Donald Kipkorir (Kenya)
In Africa, the birth of a child is a reason to engage in wanton revelry and even orgies. We celebrate the birth of a child because we always hope that he will survive the harsh realities of upbringing to adulthood. When the Republic of South Sudan was born on July 9, we all danced and celebrated. In a dash, it joined UN on July 14 and AU on July 28. I now get this eerily feeling that we danced too soon and that the Government of South Sudan (GoSS) has taken a wrong turn.
I have long praised GoSS. My reasons for supporting GoSS are ideological, religious and tribal. Ideological because am a liberal democrat while Khartoum under President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, wanted by ICC for crimes against humanity, is an Islamic autocracy. Religious and tribal because majority of the GoSS people are Roman Catholics and Nilotic, both of which I am. The region that now forms GoSS was for hundreds of years under British colonial rule, while the northern part that forms Jumh r yat as-S d n (Republic of Sudan) changed hands so many times. However, just before independence in 1956, the entire Sudan was under British rule. Sudan was granted independence on condition it will be a federal government with Arab North and Christian/Animist having nearly equal political powers. The Arab North reneged leading to the most protracted civil war that ended in the independence of GoSS last month.
With such a sordid history of racial and religious discrimination for so long, we hedged all our bets that GoSS will be a new and different child of Africa. With its abundance resources in oil, iron ore, copper, timber and other yet to be exploited minerals, we knew GoSS will have privileged upbringing. With few inches of tarmac road and only two dilapidated airstrips, GoSS is destined to be the new economic frontier. However, like Kenya, Nigeria, Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda who took a wrong turn on being granted independence and have since gotten lost on that wrong turn; GoSS is doing exactly the same, only one month after independence.
She has adopted the triple ills of Africa, lock-stock &barrel! In less than a month after independence, GoSS is entrenching negative tribalism, grand corruption and political hubris. My friends who travel regularly to Juba tell me horror stories of the wrong turn. Take the politics. The President of GoSS is officially addressed as His Excellency Lt Gen Salva Kiir Mayardit, Supreme Commander of the Sudan People Liberation Army (SPLA) and Chairman of Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, and the Vice President is addressed mouthful as His Excellency Lt Gen Dr Rick Machiar Teny! If the long titles aren’t symptoms of political hubris, what is?
The Government structure of GoSS is another pointer of things gone wrong. In the Executive structure, the President and Vice President sit a top the pyramid followed by SPLA and Presidential Advisors, next are State Governors and at the bottom are Ministers. When you look at this structure, you get a reminder of Zimbabwe that initially begun well.
Zimbabwe lost its way ten years after independence when Robert Mugabe experienced late epiphany and realised he needed to put liberation veterans at the top. Liberation wars ingratiate in warriors the mentality of destruction and siege and it never stops even when one is in Government. It takes a Nelson Mandela to transition from liberation to leadership psyche. I have the biggest trepidation that SPLA, who with tremendous respect is filled in its ranks with semi-illiterate war veterans, will plunder the resources of South Sudan.
Tribalism and grand corruption are Siamese twins. Though mainly Nilotic and predominantly Dinka and Nuer tribes, there are more than 60 ethnic groups in South Sudan. The SPLA and the Government which is two sides of one coin is predominantly Dinka. There are growing murmurs and discontent that the Government has been hijacked by the Dinka. As always, the Government will pooh-boo these murmurs as machinations of State enemies.
Same complaints were made in the initial periods in most post-colonial Africa and same rejections were given. And 50 years after independence, most of Africa is now deep in negative tribalism that has supplanted and stunted growth of nationalism.
Grand corruption is being nurtured in GoSS and at times in farcical proportions. My friends tell me of Government Ministers and SPLA Generals literally hawking Government tenders to the highest bidders. Mineral rights and land leases are traded with abandon and without rules. The latest episode involves the printing of the new South Sudan currency. The Minister for Finance, who is in acting capacity, gave the tender to a consortium that included his daughter. The currency was printed in such a hurry and with utter negligence that it is the first currency in the world with no dates. Its validity as legal tender is now in doubts.
When GoSS created its flag by combining our flag and that of The Republic of Sudan, we didn’t know that they wanted to emulate the worst of both Nairobi and Khartoum: negative tribalism, grand corruption and political hubris. The dashed dreams on GoSS reminds me of that fabled city of El Dorado. Legend has it that a tribal King wrapped himself in gold and disappeared into a lake in what is now modern day Quito, Ecuador.
Since 1541, treasure hunters have been scourging the lake for the gold, not the body of the King, but in vain. Africa with all its abundant riches is like that King; all wrapped in gold but drowned in a lake of deferred and failed dreams. We weep for GoSS. Its innocence taken away so soon.
The author is an Advocate of the High Court.
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