Not Every Nuer has a Date with Riek Machar
By Daidït Maa
The shooting yesterday in Juba found me at Jebel Market with my cousins. First when we heard gunshots, we thought it was some drunken Anyanya guys shooting themselves. It is common to hear gunshots here and there in Juba. No one used to give a damn about it till the December 15 ‘coup attempt’ that the government claimed was staged by Riek Machar.
Since then, any slightest sounds of gunfire have been attracting everyone’s attention and arouse their fear. But things had improved a little bit in Juba and normalcy was almost dawning on the city—till yesterday on March 5.
Heavy firing followed the sporadic gunshots and so we, like all the people in the market, ran away for our dear lives. We just ran away as far as we could from the direction of Gieda where the fighting was concentrated. We soon found ourselves at the National Security headquarters next to Jebel Kujur. As we approached, we saw all the soldiers, fully armed and in uniformed, cowering on the ground behind big rocks and in holes. Their guns cocked and eyes red.
Then I heard them speaking in Nuer! I thought we had fallen into an ambush. Back in my mind, I was sure that the shooting was another incident like what happened last year on December 15. It was a fight between the Nuer and the Dinka soldiers. I thought that it was the same case again: Dinka armed men versus Nuer armed guys.
Finding armed men speaking Nuer at the Headquarters of National Security was something unexpected. They beckoned at us, we were many, and having no alternative we just went, ready to face our destiny. That last year incident claimed many lives, this one would be too and we could be the first victims, I was reasoning to myself.
But then they asked us where we were coming from and going to. We told them that we were from Jebel Market and we were just running away from the whistling bullets emanating from Gieda military barrack. They signaled us to proceed, much to our relief and surprise. So they were our forces. That was when it finally dawned on me that there are Nuer soldiers too in the army and that it is not every armed Nuer that is baying for my Dinka blood.
In fact, the presidential guards where the last year fighting began is still about 50% Nuer. South Sudan army has three sectors and eight divisions. Two of these sectors are led by Nuers—Gony Bilieu in Malakal, Upper Nile sector and James Chuol Lam in Torit, Equatoria Sector. Most of the soldiers fighting in Upper Nile around Malakal are mostly Nuer while the majority of the Nuer soldiers in six out of the eight divisions of the SPLA haven’t defected to the rebel sides.
Later on as news of the shooting in Gieda yesterday trickled in, it was revealed that the issue centered on salaries, not armed rebellion by Nuer soldiers as some people had widely suspected and feared. The commander of the soldiers is a Nuer and the soldiers are mixture of all tribes.
So we should all know, as I ruefully discovered, that not all Nuer have a date with Riek Machar and his senseless armed rebellion.
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