Is this a South Sudan we fought for?
4 min readBy Mayen Mangok Mayen
South Sudan youngest nation in the world have fought two major wars from Sudan to achieve her independence, The region has been negatively affected by two civil wars since before South Sudanese independence, resulted in serious neglect, lack of infrastructural development, and major destruction and displacement. More than 2.5 million people have been killed, and more than five million have become externally displaced while others have been internally displaced.
In 1955, one year before Sudan achieved independence, the First Sudanese Civil War started, with aims of achieving representation and more regional autonomy. For seventeen years, the Sudanese government fought the Anyanya rebel army In 1971, former army Lt. Joseph Lagu gathered all the guerrilla bands under his South Sudan Liberation Movement (SSLM), it was first war that separatists fought together for independence of South Sudan and It was also the first organization that could claim to speak for, and negotiate on behalf of, the entire south. Mediation between the World Council of Churches (WCC) and the All Africa Conference of Churches (AACC) eventually led to the signing of the Addis Ababa Agreement in 1972.
In 1983 second rebellions pop up, after President Gaafar Nimeiry declared all Sudan an Islamic state under Shari’a law, including the non-Islamic majority southern region. The Southern Sudan Autonomous Region was abolished on 5 June 1983, ending the Addis Ababa Agreement. In direct response to this, the Sudan People’s Liberation Army/Movement (SPLA/M) was formed under the leadership of Dr,John Garang Mabior, and the Second Sudanese Civil War erupted. Several factions split from the SPLA often along ethnic lines and were funded and armed by Khartoum, with the most notable being the SPLA-Nasir in 1991 led by Riek Machar
That is brief background of our struggle for independence and my question above come in ” is this a South Sudan we fought for”, and my answer is no..
we have turn away from our main quest for independence, our focus was to get a country of our own, a country that can respects her citizens’ right, a country that have rule of laws, a country which is above all the sixty four tribes, a country that can educated her citizens through better system of education, a country that can provide protection to her citizens, a country that can provide clean drinking running water, a country that can build roads and railways not a country of wars… not to bore you, we have turn our country in debris abyss, nepotism, corruption, sectarianism, tribalism, field of rebellions and counter blaming of each other forgetting that our country development needs all stakeholders either you are the President or Minister up to last staff in government payroll your roles matter.
However, South Sudan is richest nation in Eastern Africa and we are not utilizing her riches to develop its by building infrastructures such schools, health centers, roads, railways, agriculture and we instead turn South Sudan to be war zone… why are we fighting one another? is it because we are used to wars? we must appreciates our diversity, being region, religion, tribes or gender let embrace spirit of togetherness, nationhood and there we shall develop.
Most importance thing to mention is, lets’ end this useless war of power struggle and preaches peace to our communities….it keeps bothering me reading and seeing educated South Sudanese preaching wars against our people and they are enjoying good live in foreign’s capitals, they eats well, sleep well, drink clean water using IGAD’s money, and they in turn keep prolonging the war without considering the suffering of our people who are being watered under tree, raped, force to be refugee in foreign land, dying of starvation. why are we surviving on the expenses of our masses?, we have to look back and see the suffering of our people.
last but not less, Am urging our leaders to end the suffering of our beloved nation and her people, let put our country first, our innocent people and their resources. As H. L. Mencken said “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins or bad fairy, all of them imaginary”. we need you to do everything possible to end this useless war of fame, power greed, positions.
To rest my point we need a south Sudan of peace not war, South Sudan of equality not inequality, development not underdevelopment, where is rule of laws, running clean drinking water, electricity, schools, hospitals, south Sudan that is above our tribes, south Sudan with good security and good governance through people’s wills (elections not bullets) and so much then we shall be okay without jobs if need be because our necessities are mentioned above.
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