South Sudan Beyond Tribal Warlords
10 min readIf we ought to live peaceful and prosperously in South Sudan, we must let go of tribal warlords
By Philips Al-Ghai
“For heaven’s sake, we should start realizing that the parasites sucking the life out of S. Sudan are not those tribes we frequently keep pointing fingers at… They stroll right in the corridors of the parliament buildings in Juba, discussing when to put the next iron yoke on the necks of the poor to ensure they remain subdued! Yes, they want us to blame ourselves for our problems when they are exactly the problem. If we need to change the painful history of S. Sudan and rescue the interests of the common S. Sudanese then we must choose to stand together against these bloody flukes, lest we all perish in the aftermath of tribal politics and the rest becomes history.”
Those were the dying lines of my first opinion ‘Tribes are our Diversity; Greedy Politicians are our Common Adversity” published by South Sudan News Agency website on May 9, 2013. Barely eight months elapsed before they [politicians] set the nation aflame. Soldiers turned against their comrades. Neighbors were out for each other’s blood. And tribal identity instantaneously became a curse amongst common S. Sudanese. How sad their dirty actions never lie!
Looking back on five months of raging bloodbath, rape, and displacement of innocent S. Sudanese, one can’t help but shake his head in dismay.
The most abhorrent part though, perhaps the most worrying and a potential threat to any lingering thought of a better future, is the reaction of S. Sudanese youths. Most of them, instead of standing against the idiocy that was long unfolding before our eyes, took a rather sycophantic stance; identifying themselves as pro-Riek or pro-Kiir. In every corner of social media you see them too upbeat about the war; cheering the capture and re-capture of towns, spreading tribal propagandas, and [shamelessly] trying to justify, by hooks or crooks, the atrocities of their tribal murderers. How pathetic! Without a shadow of doubt, most of these youths have either lost a parent, a sibling or a relative in the historic Sudan wars and ought to know a thing or two about the effects of any war.
Moreover, most of them have been to peaceful countries and ought to know payoffs of tolerance. One would, therefore, expect everyone to denounce this war unequivocally. If these experiences are not enough then the nature of the conflict per se should suffice our perceptual consciousness. Except on tribal grounds, neither president Kiir nor Dr. Riek is a victim of the ongoing skirmishes. One might firmly argue Dr. Riek’s innocence considering the ghost ‘coup’ narrative, but his subsequent actions make him no different from Kiir. Of course either is just as iniquitous as Lucifer and as murderous as Hitler. So, rallying behind them does not only betray the near a hundred percent votes we casted during the referendum, but also sacrifice the lives of innocent people we ought to stand for.
Sadly, it appears we’ve nurtured a culture of undiscerning allegiance to tribal political figures, and former Lakes State governor Hon. Chol Tong Mayay was at hand with these wise words, for S. Sudanese youths, on that historic SPLM conference on December 6, 2013:
“Let not a leader lose his position and go back to mobilize his tribesmen. I’m sure you out there you don’t share his fat salaries; the salaries we get. The situation you are in…. we [in reference to his comrades] who are sitting here all, you know that all our families, all our children are eating ice cream, are playing with toys. And you down there…. he/she who has no person in the government, you don’t know what is called ice cream, your child doesn’t know what is called ice cream, your child doesn’t know toys, and I do say always that we’re foreigners ruling you. Because we don’t know the state of hospitals; because our women do deliver in very good hospitals… When we get headache, we go to Nairobi and Uganda… and this is the state of affairs we are in.”
Hon. Mayay, a member of the group often smeared as ‘disgruntled’ simply for speaking out the putrescence within the SPLM, was not oblivious to issues of relevance that conjure up critical thinking. Even for flatly dead brains. Although he still identifies himself with the failed SPLM, he rightfully observed that their performance since the signing of Comprehensive Peace Agreement deserves nothing, but qualifies them as bunches of foreigners ruling us.
That’s exactly what we have witnessed in the last eight years or so. It is no brainer. This is further substantiated by the negligence shown by both Kiir and Riek in the face of the ongoing ethnic butchering under their noses. As the nation bleed, Kiir unwittingly found it fitting to lament about his image: “If you just kill people in my name, then my image will be gone,” he moaned as reported by Gurtong website, January 2014, 2014. Dr. Riek, on the other hand, went silent altogether and had no official order discouraging ethnic cleansing by his troops rebel controlled areas.
Neither had a word of solace to the distraught nation whatsoever, let alone visiting those affected. Had we heeded Hon. Mayay’s advice no S. Sudanese soldier would have pointed his gun barrel at a civilian or a comrade, no Nuer or Dinka would have spilled the blood of his countryman, and no youth would have accepted to carry out atrocities on behalf of Riek and Kiir. Still, if we take Hon. Mayay’s words with a grain of salt, Riek and Kiir would be asked to account for the innocent blood in their hands.
As things stand, it is apparent that there is no military solution to the conflict. The rebels will never shoot their way to Juba, and the government will never flush the rebels out of S. Sudan. Either is possible only in imaginations and you need not burden yourself hoping unless you are that guy…
President Kiir and Dr. Riek will predictably shake hands and dine on the same table some day. Maybe soon. Yet they are wasting, in senseless battles, the very men [SPLA] –rebels or government soldiers –we need to keep the claim of our borders with Sudan, Uganda and Kenya relevant in future. Painfully, the orphans of their cooked conflict are bound to flock the garbage bins and waste dumping sites for food and shelter.
Widows struggling to make ends meet will be forced to sell themselves to afford treatment for their ailing kids. Young men robbed of livelihood and recruited into tribal militias [without pay] will morph into a new generation of indiscriminate killer gangs. Summarily, before our own eyes, they have nipped S. Sudan in the bud. They have ripped the heart off our great nation. Is this what we proudly support Riek and Kiir for?
Lest we start seeing S. Sudan beyond tribal warlords, we are all bound to sink to the nether regardless of whether one is a staunch tribal pro-rebel or a tribal pro-government.
Philips Al-Ghai is a proud S. Sudanese and can be reached at alghai211@gmail.com or on Twitter @ Al_Ghai211.
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Tribes are our Diversity; Greedy Politicians are our Common Adversity
By Philips Al-Ghai
If the ancient proverb still holds true, at least in the 21st century, then it ought to be that ‘A fight between grasshoppers is a joy to the crow’.
Literally, this is the painful truth that S. Sudanese are destined to live through. The rulers seem to plot strategies that would send the public helter-skelter, pointing accusing fingers at their respective tribes. With innocent citizens sensitized and craved to swallow each other, the trouble instigators [some call them politicians, others leaders….I call them rulers] grin with satisfaction that they can now manipulate and exploit their weakened subjects comfortably.
How does anyone find it logical to superimpose the national menace onto certain tribes? If we truly have functional visual systems, we would see –quite conspicuously –that citizens who paid the heaviest price toward the liberation of S. Sudan are still hunted by hunger and curable diseases down there at the nether of food chain in the villages. Absolutely, none is better than the other –whether they reside in Unity, Jonglei, Warrap, Eastern Equatoria etc. Albeit these are the very men and women who [generously] contributed their sons –the fallen heroes –during the two decades of liberation struggle. While the unburied bones of their sons lay meekly in unknown bushes, they are left to spectate in horror as the greedy morons at the apex of food chain in Juba continue to spend lavishly on sex and beer.
As audacious as it is, they comfortably execute their normal business with impunity: shuttling the excess of grabbed fortunes to Kampala, Addis Ababa, Nairobi, and even Khartoum [well, for former traitors who are still maintaining their double-standards with the North], and the rest used to fund the silencing of a few who keep revisiting the question of “Where are we going?” as in the assassination of Isaiah Abraham. These poor exploited S. Sudanese define the tribes political lunatics keep pointing fingers at. Do they really know anything about tribal hatred the rowdy literate youths and their politicians seem to champion in towns? No. Absolutely no. Still they stand right at the receiving end of all kinds of political mess, notwithstanding their genuine innocence. So, why do we often fail to vent our anger on the right targets? It is a mystery.
Hands up if there exists any differential regional development [in S. Sudan] to support the calls that Dinka, Nuer, Lotuko, or Didinga edges other tribes. Unfortunately, all phrases that carry the word ‘development’ in S. Sudan seem limited to the back pockets of the titans. The only time I hear about money allocated to certain imaginary ‘developmental projects’ is when the big-pocket pick-pocketers –call them ‘secondary thieves’ if you like –cheekily use their inadequate expertise to hijack the pockets of their bosses.
A recent theft “around” His Excellency’s premises presents a perfect example. Poor things. They will have to face the music –whether it is Rock, Blues, or Bongo. Not gospel music anyway. One would be forgiven to think that the timid judicial system, that is yet to tell the public about the stolen $4 billion or the demise of Isaiah Abraham, would be red-hot on their tails. Maybe because:
It is in the interest of the supreme caucus. Predictably if the profiles of the culprits are low and so are not subject to the famous “defamation” that most bosses dread.
It is a good opportunity to blackmail the public that the transparent justice truly exists!
Can the chicks expect fair justice when hawk is the judge? Whatever your take is, hold onto it. The other day I heard justice Gatwech swearing by his ancestors that they will “leave no stone unturned.” Well, I could sense trouble brewing and I assume the culprits know it. That is how ugly it can be when you opt to purloin from a purloiner. Whether the robbed S. Sudanese public would dub them ‘local heroes’ is solely your take. But you would pity them, wouldn’t you? Let’s pray they don’t get crucified before Easter next year. That aside.
In any event, there is only one tribe that S. Sudanese should not only point accusing fingers at, but also demand what rightfully belongs to the neglected S. Sudanese in villages: Bloody Robbers within the SPLM government!
Make no mistake, these are the men who witnessed their comrades fell at the front-lines; they are the living heroes we expect to instill the spirit of nationalism in the generations to come. S. Sudanese expect the best service from them. Yet, breathtakingly, they have taken the heroes-to-zeroes’ turn by using tribal qualms to their selfish gains. Their non-ideological lame-sort-of politics is turning the impoverished S. Sudanese against themselves. They have earned themselves a perfect opportunity to exploit and kill when they want simply by keeping S. Sudanese tribes engaged in the old fashioned politics of “them vs us”. They are at it.
Attend a social media sermon about S. Sudan, one of these days, and you will be, exceedingly, bored! All are conducted in only one language: Tribal Hatred! It transpires that many people easily grow allergic to honest criticisms by other members of the public –not on the basis ideological differences, but on the grounds of tribal affiliations! How weird everyone look desperate to relinquish their constitutional rights to the advantage of thieves! One always wonders whether S. Sudanese youths are too fatuous to learn from the past. It just doesn’t add up.
For heaven’s sake, we should start realizing that the parasites sucking the life out of S. Sudan are not those tribes we frequently keep pointing fingers at –neither the majority we see begging on the streets nor those who are still tilling the land with stone-age tools in villages. They stroll right in the corridors of the parliament buildings in Juba, discussing when to put the next iron yoke on the necks of the poor to ensure they remain subdued! Yes, they want us to blame ourselves for our problems when they are exactly the problem.
If we need to change the painful history of S. Sudan and rescue the interests of the common S. Sudanese then we must choose to stand together against these bloody flukes, lest we all perish in the aftermath of tribal politics and the rest becomes history.
Philips Al-Ghai can be reached at alghai211@gmail.com
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