By Apioth Mayom Apioth
To all our Dinka Community members, please I am hereby urging you to continuously refrain from inciting internecine war of division among ourselves. There is no proven scientific data evidently available that the Dinka of Jonglei state are more intelligent than our brotherly counterparts in the Greater Bhar Ghazal or other parts of the Greater Upper Nile region. This baseless and senseless apathy has to stop from here. What we rather should be doing is to perpetually pull our resources together with an aim of catapulting our varied Dinka communities forward instead of turning against one another; as this could allow others to take advantage of our cohesiveness and benefit tremendously from our war-lording.
The sole purpose of this short paper is to drum the ideas of unity and forward-thinking into the minds of all our brethren instead of heralding divisive unfounded grudges from here and there. Our brotherly counterparts from the Greater Bhar Ghazal region have been doing exceptionally well in all spheres of life; A few examples of the many spheres of life where they are mammothly represented are politics, business, science, and education. If you have been paying a special attention to the news harbingers in South Sudan, then I probably assume you have read about how some students from Marial Baai Secondary School in Northern Bhar Ghazal State came out ranked in the top 10% nationally last year. There is nothing wrong with being more intelligent than others, however, there is no palpable data available in the market to prove anyone right. If anyone from the Dinka sub-tribes of Jonglei State would dare to name their highly successful lot, then other Dinka sub-tribes from other regions would follow suit and play that game of tit for tat. Tribal grouping is the fate we won’t escape anytime soon. If there were some few talented individuals among the many sub-tribes of the Dinka nation, then we ought to harness their creativity among ourselves to bring out the best in the Greater Dinka Community. Imagine, in the foreseeable future, there are no tribal affiliations in South Sudan and everyone is known as just a South Sudanese or Juwamese ( from Juwama), how do you think we should be remembered as one of the many tribes that once roamed this beautiful land of ours? In this case, there are no individuals that go with the names like Maker Nhial, or Alic Deng, but the new generation of South Sudanese go by the names like Lado Marial, Thon Puot, or Atem Uduong. In this time of distress in South Sudan, everyone is yearning for economic prosperity to take over in the greater realm of our nation. If our tribe successfully managed to become the greatest game – changer in the political affairs of our nation, then history will be so kind to us and remember us vividly in that light. For us to garner anything substantial, we have to make unity the daily staple of our day to day activities. Change is inevitable and we rather change with it or die out altogether without living any trace of our past existence.
As an old saying puts it appropriately: “ A besieged castle, no matter how weak its defense walls are, it can only crumble from the inside”; Our internal war-lording could be the start to our eventual demise on the face of the earth. The idea to always forge ahead and be better than others is part of our human phenomena. Instead of always trying single-handedly to be better as an individual, why shouldn’t we always aim to escape from our ills as one wholesome community. The decisions we make as a community have both good and severe consequences in the not so distant future.
How does strong wind of change come about? It comes from every walk of life, even from a mere humble beginning. For the Dinka community to have a solid grounding in the Greater South Sudan Nation, we need to constantly nip out petty voices whose immediate goals are to destabilize our greater aspirations of making South Sudan, a greater power to contend with the world over. Our first priority ought to be solidifying our strengths and emerge even stronger; that way we can successfully emerge triumphant in pacifying the vast diverse communities of South Sudan. Our people are still being discriminated against in many parts of South Sudan up to this day. In places like Mundri, Kajo Keji, among other places, they are being questioned about why they are still staying there and the war is over.
How can we win the hearts and minds of the vast different tribes across South Sudan? In order to banish the negative perception that we are the new colonizers of South Sudan; And since they see as guests who won’t just go away, we rather ought to be more inclusive and be open-minded about those immediate communities that are housing our communities. For this to come to fruition; we can just employ an atmosphere of mutual understanding by letting them know who we really are, and, on the other hand, embark on a mission of understanding the greatest things they mostly cherish in their cultures. Exchange of ideas, norms and societal values are the keys to bettering our relations with those who see us as brutish occupiers. By having done so, those who were carrying beclouded washed-up animosities against us would instead let their guard down and welcome us with open arms. No one under any circumstances should be regarded as a foreigner in his or her own country. However, not every citizen of South Sudan sees it that way. A tribal grouping comes first before the ideals of nationalist awareness and consciousness.
Apioth Mayom Apioth. Email:generalpito@hotmail.com