I want to share this conversation with south Sudan citizens.
6 min readBy Obang, Minnesota, USA
Today as my shift ended, I went to make oil change from someone usually go to. This was at 12:09pm central time. As I was there, an Ethiopian man comes in checking on his car if the repair was done on his car. He come and set in the recipient where I was setting waiting for oil change on my Honda Accord, 2002.
Here is how the conversation started.
An Ethiopian: he greeted me in Kiswahili, Haabari Yako? I said I don’t know Kiswahili. All I know is just that. He said where are you from?
Me: I’m from south Sudan.
An Ethiopian: ok, I thought you are from Kenya.
Me, no but I lived in Kenya for two years before coming to the USA and lived in Itang, Ethiopian during those years of our civil war.
An Ethiopian: ok so why are you still here? Business is booming in your country. You should go back in start your business or work for the government.
Me: I’m thinking of going next year, 2014. You right I know that business is booming but our people don’t have money to start their own business because we were in the bush for all those years. Brother, we went back to south Sudan with no cash on hand at all but only gun. But our leaders are the one who may have money in their hand when we went back during the CPA, in 2005. The only people who are benefiting from our country independent are our neighbor’s country, such as your country, Kenya, Uganda, and Congo, DRC, because they got money and they are the one running businesses in south Sudan right now more than our citizen.
An Ethiopian: You right I heard that from friends who are doing business in south Sudan and they told me that, approximately 75% of businesses in south Sudan are run by foreigners. Even some position in government and NGO are held by foreigners.
Me: You know what I have not been in my country since independence. I will not give you figures or hear saying from friends. What I know for sure, businesses are running of the neighbor’s country.
An Ethiopian: why are you guys fighting for if you can’t run your own country’s affairs? Giving almost everything to foreigners? Those people are just there for their own interest.
Me: You are right on your questions, I’m not a politician but politically, there are these sayings, in time of war politician used the words, ours in time of peace politician used the word my administration. You see the different brothers. We fought hand in hand to get our independent but when our country becomes independent, our leaders forget everything they fought united to win their freedom. Our country has been independent for 2 years now but no development has been reached to our citizen across the country. But 2% of the population are billionaires in those few years of our independent, can you imagine.
Me: Don’t you think that the reason there are a lot of Ethiopian, Kenyan Uganda and DRC and other countries who are working in our government and running businesses specially your country seem to be the top, is it’s that due to hosting or helping us during our civil war including the Any-nya I?
An Ethiopian: I can’t talk about other countries but I will talk about my countries. Ethiopian never helps south Sudan for no motive, there was interest there because, and Eritrean was based in Sudan at the time and other important items. These relationships are not real in heart of Ethiopian. Let say south Sudan decided to break the relationship with Ethiopian, believe me there, Ethiopia will bring war to your country like what they did in Somalia. All those are just interest that’s it my brother.
An Ethiopian says: I live in Kenya for 6 years. In Kenya prostitutes is provided in their constitution. If you get arrested doing prostitution that person will be arrested and jail by authority. Now since the Ethiopian got to Kenya in numbers when Derge regime was overthrown by the current regime, today you can see prostitution practice in Kenya. That will happen in south Sudan too. My friends in south Sudan told me that South Sudanese are interacting with Ethiopian woman a lot. Intermarriage is going on by south Sudanese men, even those with high ranking. But my brother, the majority of those Ethiopian in southern women in south Sudan were prostitute in Ethiopia who may had HIV or may had not have HIV. That is what my friends in south Sudan were telling me of those Ethiopian women are doing.
Me: in your saying here, I have heard from friends in Juba that Ethiopian are doing businesses in every state in southern Sudan and the practice of prostitution is getting increasing by the day. But I can’t talk about whether the majority of Ethiopian women who are doing business in south Sudan are HIV positive, because I have not been in the country since independence.
An Ethiopian says: when I was in Kenya, I used to work at the restaurant. One day one south Sudanese who have a high position in the government asked me while I was serving him. He said, are you an Ethiopian man? I said yes, and he said do you have an education? I said yes, a nurse. He said why don’t you go to south Sudan and work. I said do you think I will get a job? He said, why not, just come here is my contact number. My father is working in the government in high position and he is married to Ethiopian woman, he will give you a job right away.
Me: I said, I will call that nepotism. I have nothing much to say about that my brother, such a system is practically everywhere in our continent and around the globe. You have gone for the job then coming to America.
My point here is this, is our government really run by foreigners? Are our leaders doing such behavior? Why don’t run our own fairs than giving jobs to foreigners. I don’t get it. We have a lot of our educated citizens who come back from Sudan and those who educated in neighbor country, plus those studies abroad. If you are currently working in the government, our government should look deeply to such practices. It’s embarrassing to degrade our country value from any country. Plus, I was already unhappy of the article I read about our embassy in Eritrean with those Eritrean citizens working at our embassy with position. It’s very shame on us as an independent nation to have noncitizen with a position like secretary. Do we have south Sudanese citizen in Eritrean embassies who are working holding such position as secretary? Can someone tell me that? This may look like an important matter but depend on how you think of it and your translation.
End of conversation: My car oil change was done, I said thank you for talking with you east African brother.
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