The Most Influential South Sudanese of the Year 2014 (Part 2)
17 min readThe SSB’s Persons of the Year
By PaanLuel Wël, Juba
January 5, 2015 (SSB) — In Part One of this series, I have discussed some seven politicians in South Sudan that, I believe, are qualified for the title of the most influential South Sudanese politicians of the year 2014. As previously stated, this is a contentious categorization simply because the concept is both slippery and divisive. With that in mind, here is the continuation of the most influential politicians in the South Sudanese’ political discourse of the year 2014:
- Simon Kun Puoch Mar, Governor of Upper Nile State
Simon Kun Puoch Mar is the current governor of Upper Nile state and a staunch supporter of President Kiir. On the night of December 15th, 2013, when gunfight broke out in Gyeda within the presidential guards unit, Governor Kun Puoch, like all the governors, was in Juba city, attending the Governors’ Forum. On the 18th of December, he went back to Malakal and publicly disputed the alleged mass killing of Nuer civilians in Juba. Reportedly, he blamed it all on Riek Machar and his supporters—the violent and any life lost on, and in the days following, December 15th mutiny. But most of his subjects, majority of whom were members of his Nuer community, were not swayed by his version of events. They were convinced that a massacre of unarmed Nuer civilians had occurred in Juba and the governor was living in denial, for a reason better known to himself. Consequently, on December 20th, a group of about 50 Nuer elders—led by Maj. Gen. Gathoth Gatkouth who was Governor Simon Kun‘s security advisor and Maj. Gen Saddam Chayuot Manyang—went to see the governor at the state house. Gathoth Gatkuoth and Saddam Chayuot—just like Governor Kun Puoch—hail from Eastern Jikany Nuer community in Upper Nile state. Their mission was to convince the Governor to defect to the rebels and for them to take over Malakal much as Peter Gatdet had defected and took over Bor town. Instead, Governor Simon Kun threatened to arrest them on spot. That night, one version of event narrated, Gathoth Gatkuoth and Saddam Chayuot Manyang escaped to the UNMISS camp, fearing for their lives. On the morning of December 24th, supposedly a merry Christmas Eve, gunfire broke out all over Malakal in a running battle pitting the armed supporters of Riek Machar against the loyalists of the government. On the government side were Governor Simon Kun and Gen. Gony Bilieu—head of SPLA sector three in the Greater Upper Nile Region, based in Malakal. The SPLA defectors took over Malakal after a full day battle. However, the battle of December 24th marked a new rebirth of Governor Simon Kun (having been with the NCP during the SPLM/A war) as a force to reckon with in the South Sudanese politics. Henceforward, he has been leading a vigorous military and political campaign against the rebels—commanded by his former security advisor, Gathoth Gatkuoth—in Upper Nile state. Like Governor Joseph Monytuil of Unity state, Governor Kun Puoch has succeeded to retain the loyalty of armed Nuer soldiers fighting and dying on the side of the government. Within his Jikany Nuer community, he has also succeeded to convince some community leaders and politicians to publicly declare their allegiance to the government. Without him and Gen. Gony Bilieu, it is unthinkable that the government would still be in Malakal, let alone Nasir and other surrounding areas such as Renk and Paloch oilfields. This makes Governor Kun Puoch an influential politician in the republic of South Sudan for the year 2014.
9. Barnaba Marial Benjamin Bil, Secretary of State.
Dr. Marial Benjamin (a medical doctor with a certificate in international affairs from Southern Africa) is currently South Sudan’s minister for Foreign Affairs. Like Hon. Makwei Lueth, he is among the few ministers who have been in office since the constitution of GoSS in 2005. Hon. Marial first entered into South Sudanese politics in early 1983 when Riek Machar (then a student in the UK) and Hon. Benjamin Bol Akook founded the Sudan Revolutionary Front (SRF) party. By then, Marial was in London and was among the founders of the SRF, formed (just like the SPLM/A) to fight for the liberation of the whole Sudan. In 1984, Bol Akook died mysteriously in Addis Ababa, a death blamed on Kerubino Kuanyin Bol; and Riek Machar later ended up joining the SPLM/A and became Chairman Garang’s adjutant. Marial followed Riek into the SPLM/A. Chairman Garang appointed him the SPLM/A representative to Southern African countries. Dr. Kon Bior Duoot was the SPLM representative to East Africa countries, while Elijah Malok Aleng (for a while) was sent to DRC Congo, representing SPLM in the Franco-phone nations. When Riek Machar rebelled in 1991, Ater and Maker Benjamin Bil, Marial brothers, joined him. Marial remained with the mainstream SPLM/A; he never left the Movement, much of which might explain his long tenure in Kiir’s government and past closeness to Chairman Garang. Since the civil war broke out in December 2013, Marial has been the face and voice of the government on international and regional arenas. He has been thoroughly grilled on BBC Hardtalks and has appeared on other numerous news media and forums not just to explain controversial government policies but also to defend inexplicable government positions. Unlike the aggressive and volatile Hon. Makwei Lueth, Marial is cool-headed and measured, well educated and very informed about the interplays of international relations. This is why President Kiir sent him to Washington DC when the Obama administration threatened to levy sanction on the warring factions of South Sudan. The visit paid off handsomely, for the UN bill initiated by the USA was later withdrawn at the insistence of the USA government. Like a great politician, Marial has sometimes lied his ways into arguments. His lies, however, are clothed in subtleties that make you sympathize with the arduous role he is playing for the government that he serves. This is one individual that President Kiir has been relying on for the formulation of his muddled foreign policies. Besides John Gai Yoh, minister for education, Marial Benjamin is one shinning star among the minister of South Sudan. Though definitely a member of the 75 mafia, he seems to be moderately corrupted, for that matter.
10. Telar Takpiny Ring Deng, the Power behind the Throne
In medieval European kingdoms, there used to be a person, or a group of them, that informally exercises the real power of the reigning king or queen. In our modern era, there still are individuals, or a privileged clique, who still serve as the de facto leader, setting policy through possessing great influence and/or skillful manipulation of national politics. In most modern nation-states, it is either the spouse (Michelle Obama in the USA) or the close relatives/brother/son (Museveni’s brother, Salim, in Uganda) or a mother/father (Mama Ngina Kenyatta, mother of President Uhuru, in Kenya). In the republic of South Sudan, that person, at least in the years and months and days leading up to December 15th, has been Hon. Telar Ring Takpiny Deng. During the war, Telar was a military magistrate under SPLA zonal Commander Riek Machar Teny. He was entrusted with determining nothing less than the life and death of SPLA soldiers under his lawyerly jurisdiction. He joined the Nasir camp in 1991 but was the first leader, together with Dengtiel Ayuen Kuur, to return to the SPLM/A, partly in disgust with the 1991 Bor Massacre and partly in protest to the signing of the traitorous Frankfurt Agreement between the Nasir group and Khartoum government. After the CPA, Telar was appointed minister of the presidency of Southern Sudan in 2005. Telar and Aleu Ayieny bitterly fell out with President Kiir, an incident that Aleu Ayieny squarely blamed on Pagan Amum. Commander Aleu Ayieny, then in charge of SPLM/A military intelligence and security, was adamant that the Ugandan government, with the assistance of some rogue elements within the SPLM/A who had long been anti-Garang, was responsible for the demised of Dr. John Garang. Both gentlemen were summarily dismissed from the SPLM party on 23 November 2007. Both men, however, were reinstated into the SPLM party by a presidential decree on August 28, 2009 and then made a spectacularly comeback, with, first, their appointments as presidential advisors. Telar was the legal presidential advisor. Critics maintain that it was Telar Ring Deng, the power behind the throne, who masterminded the suspension of Pagan Amum as a retribution for their dismissal in 2007, and later the sacking of the entire cabinet in July 2013 that saw Dr. Riek Machar losing the post of the vice presidency. In effect, the argument goes, Telar is politically responsible for the events that later culminated into Dec 15th violence. And because the dismissed members of the cabinet believed that it was Telar who had engineered their political downfall, they effectively ganged up in parliament and successfully blocked the appointment of Telar as Minister for Justice. When the West and the UN threatened targeted sanctions on South Sudan, President Kiir, in a move calculated to demonstrate his eastwardness, dispatched Telar to Moscow as his ambassador, effectively countering Western pressure. Besides Gen. Malong Awan, there is no any other person in South Sudan who is as politically influential as Telar Ring Takpiny Deng. He is the power behind the throne; some claim him to be ‘the de facto president’ of South Sudan.
11. Peter Adwok Nyaba, the Nation Sorcerer
Few politicians in South Sudan are as well educated and legendarily controversial as Dr. Peter Adwok Nyaba. It was Adwok Nyaba who advised the scheming Lam Akol to recruit Dr. Riek Machar (he has a bigger Nuer following, Adwok instruct) for the launch of the 1991 Nasir coup. It was Adwok Nyaba who penned the December 6th press statement by the Riek-Pagan-Nyandeng group that later precipitated political temperatures in Juba and ushered in the Dec 15th mutiny that led to the second rebellion of Riek Machar. Technically speaking, his critics insist vehemently, Adwok Nyaba is somewhat responsible for the first and second rebellion of Riek Machar. Adwok Nyaba joined the SPLM/A, together with Lam Akol, in 1986, but he was wounded in his first battle. He took leave from the movement and went to Asmara, Eritrea, to teach as a university professor. He divided his time between Asmara and Itang refugee camp, and in the process got involved (recruited by Prof. Barry Wanji) in the internal agitation for reform and democratization within the SPLM/A, a process that was then fervently resisted by all the top echelon of the movement, including Lam Akol and Riek Machar who had not yet fallen out with Chairman Garang. It was by this time that Lam Akol used to declare that the SPLM/A is too young to care about human rights and democracy, telling Khartoum delegations in Nairobi that, to paraphrase, we have jailed and killed and we are going to jail and kill more because we, as a young movement, can’t take chance with our survival. When Lam fell out with Garang, it was natural that he would approach Adwok Nyaba since it was the likes of Adwok and Wanji who were agitating for change. Adwok convinced the arrogant Lam Akol to aaporach and persuade Riek Machar to lead the rebellion against Garang, arguing that it was only Riek who have the numbers to confront Garang. Lam did as told and Adwok became the spiritual father of the 1991 Nasir coup. He later resigned spectacularly and rejoined the SPLM/A, an occasion that he marked with the publication of a highly sentimental book that demolished every one—Garang, Riek, Lam, Kerubino, Arok etc.—except himself. In a second edition of that book, he had already concluded that the only solution to the survival of the SPLM/A and the unity of South Sudanese was the total elimination of John Garang. But he had nowhere else to go, having been arrested for over six months by Lam Akol having declared Riek as an idiot, and, because he hated the Arabs, could not bring himself to go to Khartoum like Riek and Lam Akol, his accomplices. He stayed put sulking in the SPLM till the CPA and was later appointed minister, first in Khartoum on SPLM ticket and later in Juba, a position he held till he was ousted in July 2013. That is when he became the brainpower of Riek-Pagan-Nyandeng faction of the SPLM and wrote the press statement of December 6th that President Kiir didn’t take kindly to. When Dec 15th occurred, Adwok Nyaba was placed under house arrest, his passport confiscated, long after the rest of the jailed leaders were released. Even under house arrest, he was writing, and became the first person to officially put out the theory that explain what happened on the night of December 15th: he claim that Nuer soldiers were illegally disarmed while their Dinka counterparts were re-armed; this triggered the gunfight that evening in Gieda military barrack within the presidential guards. According to him, it was a premeditated ploy by the president to disarm the Nuer soldiers and then to arrest Dr. Riek Machar and other senior members of the SPLM who had attended the December 6th press conference. In June 2014, Adwok Nyaba resigned from the SPLM party and joined Dr. Riek Machar, the very man he had lambasted and called tribal bigot in his own book. Whatever one thinks of Adwok Nyaba, however inconsistently he is, he is an intellectual of the rare caliber. His prose are elegant and his mind sharp. His two recent books, both on the contemporary independent South Sudan are great reads. The main conundrum though is what to make of his ever-shifting ideological and political stance. He doesn’t seem to believe in his own analysis. Who would in the future?
12. Nhial Deng Nhial, Government chief negotiator in Addis Ababa
If there is anyone in South Sudan, and during the SPLM/A, who can come close to claim the title of a princeling, then it is Hon. Nhial Deng Nhial. He is the son of Martyred William Deng Nhial. For the largely uninformed Dinka mass, the politics of liberation in South Sudan commenced with Deng Nhial and then ended with John Garang. The rest is secondary, for few among them are aware of Father Saturlino or Joseph Lagu or Joseph Oduho. It was over Nhial Deng Nhial that Commander Salva Kiir fell out with Chairman Garang in 2004 after it was rumored that Garang was grooming the much younger Nhial to take over from Salva Kiir. The other was Pagan Amum to take over from Wani Igga, or so the rumor went. Pagan and Nhial would have then competed to take over from Garang. Salva Kiir was not amused and he made his displeasure known publicly but peacefully; history has the records. Nhial Deng, like Majak Agoot and Gier Chuang, were among the youngest commanders of the SPLM/A. As Salva Kiir was grooming Majak Agoot, Garang was grooming Nhial Deng. It is alleged that Garang used to shield him from being sent to the frontlines or from the dangerous hands of Kerubino, Nyuon and Arok. A lawyer by profession, Nhial Deng often worked as the movement de facto foreign affairs ministers, particularly after the defection of Lam Akol in 1991. He was very instrumental in the negotiation of the CPA and was one of the chief signatories. When Garang died in 2005, Nhial Deng became one of the so-called Garang Orphans as Kiirists sidelined him, probably, owing to the 2004 Yei-Rumbek crisis. He consequently took a long leave from the SPLM party and went into self-imposed political exile in London. He later reconciled with President Kiir and was appointed defense minister in preference to Kuol Manyang Juuk. He was in the cabinet until July 2013 when he was kicked out of the government. Thereafter he became associated with the Riek-Pagan-Nyandeng faction; he attended the December 6th press conference. But then President Kiir poached him from that camp and appointed him South Sudan chief negotiator, a position that had hitherto been held by Pagan until he was suspended from his position and placed under house arrest in mid-2013. By the time December 15th occurred, Nhial was firmly in the government, having effectively abandoned his Garang Boys, of which he was a co-leader with Pagan. He is currently leading government negotiation with the Riek Machar’s rebels in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Because politics in South Sudan is highly tribalized and personalized, Nhial Deng, together with Majak Agoot, is one of the young leaders that the Dinka community can still hope to vie for the office of the president in the future. He is young, educated and has a great record in the liberation struggle. The main problem is that he is largely detached and aloof from the common people. He has no charisma or passion of his former boss, John Garang, nor the humility of his current boss, President Kiir. He is sober-minded though, unlike the firebrand Pagan Amum or the seemingly elitist Majak Agoot.
13. Alfred Lado Gore, Deputy leader of the SPLM/A-IO
In the mid-1960s, young John Garang and his buddy, Alfred Lado Gore, went to visit Anyanya one camp in the Equatoria region. They were students in East Africa. By then, there was a bitter blood feud between the Dinkas and Equatorians; Major Kuol Amuom had killed his colleague, Michael Loruwe, an Equatorian, near the Sudan-Congo border, due to disputes over arms procurement. The two communities were therefore technically at war. This was unbeknown to the two adventurous buddies, who were too intoxicated with paper ideologies—of African Socialism of Julius Nyerere and Pan-Africanism of Walter Rodney—that they were eager to see operating in the Anyanya one camp. Previously, especially around 1962-3, young Garang had stayed with the younger brothers of Joseph Lagu in a refugee camp in Uganda. It was therefore natural for Garang to mingle among Equatorians or the people of Greater Bahr el Ghazal among whom he was educated. Upon arrival in one of the Anyanya one camp, Garang was arrested and sentenced to death, by firing squad. It took the intervention of Chief Andrea Gore, the father of Alfred Lado, to rescue Garang from imminent death. When the SPLM/A was founded in July 1983, Lado Gore was appointed the chief ideologue of the movement, a position that he held until he was arrested by William Nyuon (in collusion with Kerubino and Arok) who accused him of being a dangerous Marxist who was plotting to take over the movement with the help of Chol Deng Alaak, George Maker Benjamin and Amon Wantok, among others. Garang’s order to release him fell on deaf ears; he languished in jail until he was freed in the wake of the 1991 Nasir. Thereafter, in a surprise move, Lado Gore defected from the SPLM/A and joined the Nasir camp, alongside his former tormentors in the persons of William Nyuon, Kerubino Kuanyin and Arok Thon. When Joseph Oduho was killed in Kongor in March 1993, Lado Gore blamed it on Lam Akol and Riek Machar. Thus, he left the Nasir faction and, together with Dr. Richard K. Mullah and Prof Barry Wanji, formed the South Sudan Freedom Front (SSFF), hilariously referred to as South Sudan Food First—SSFF. Though their party was both politically and military inconsequential at the grassroots, they, much to their credit, never killed anyone nor did they troop to Khartoum like Riek Machar, Lam Akol, Kerubino Kuanyin, Arok Thon etc. Lado Gore later rejoined the SPLM, but was then greatly surpassed by James Wani Igga, his fellow Bari from Juba. He was appointed a presidential advisor by President Kiir. His hope to get elected governor of Central Equatoria state was grounded when the government backed Clement Wani Kong’a, a former Mundari militia leader allied to Khartoum. Lado Gore decided to stand as an independent candidate. When results came in, he cried foul, claiming that the election was rigged in favor of Clement Wani. From that time onward, he never had a close working relationship with President Kiir. His removal from the cabinet in July 2013 saw him siding with Riek Machar. Consequently, he fled the city on the night of December 15th. He was later appointed deputy to Riek Machar in a move designed to attract the political and military support of the Equatorians. It is believed that his presence in the rebel movement is meant to dispel government’s claim that Riek Machar’s rebellion is nothing more than a rebellion by one tribe against the other 63 tribes of South Sudan. Lado Gore was among the first Equatorian leaders to join the SPLM/A in the 1980s; now, he is again among the first Equatorian leaders to join Riek Machar’s second rebellion. It remains to be seen whether or not his presence in the rebellion would translate into some considerable political and military supports from the Equatoria region.
14. John Luke Jok, Former Justice Minister
To the minds of most South Sudanese, John Luke Jok is synonymous with the current transitional constitution of the republic of South Sudan that has given President Kiir unfettered powers that some consider to might have contributed to the outbreak of civil war on December 15th, 2013. John Luke, just like Barnaba Marial Benjamin, was a founding member of Riek Machar’s SRF party. He sided with the Nasir group in 1991. He later fell out with Riek Machar and was arrested and imprisoned in Waat, together with Simon Gatwech Dual. Both gentlemen are from Lou Nuer and Riek Machar, according to Lam Akol, was convinced that they were out to overthrow him from the SSIM/A leadership, especially after the outbreak of Nuer civil war pitting Lou Nuer against Jikany Nuer. As a result, John Luke returned to the SPLM/A much earlier than other defectors: he came back in 1995 after the signing of the Lafon Declaration between the SPLM/A and William Nyuon Bany. He once more became a prominent member of the movement and was part of the CPA negotiation team. He was humbly defeated in his home constituency of Akobo during the 2010 general election. He was later appointed to various ministries, among them Petroleum and Justice. It was under his ministry of justice that he drafted and controversially bulldozed through parliament the current version of the transitional constitution. Critics allege that the interim constitution has given immense powers to the presidency, powers that have been abused by President Kiir, the result of which is the present civil war. John Luke was fired in July 2013 and later ended up joining the anti-Kiir elements within the ruling SPLM party. On December 15th, he was arrested and put on trial. Upon release, he left for East Africa where he is currently the spokesperson for the former SPLM political detainees—better known as the SPLM-Leaders.
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