Speech by Ambrose Riny Thiik, Chairman of the “Jieng Council of Elders”
The Jieng Council of Elders
The Remarks of the Chairman of the Delegation of the Jieng Council of Elders to the Jieng — Nuer Consultative Meeting for Peace in Nairobi on Tuesday June 9, 2015
Gen. Opande Chairperson of the Consultative Meeting, and
The facilitation team of the Moi Africa Institute,
My fellow compatriots,
June 17, 2015 (SSB) — I am deeply humbled and privileged to address this historic gathering of the South Sudanese elders who have come all the way from various places in search for peace. It is only fitting that this occasion is held in Nairobi, the city that brought us the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) in 2005. More especially, we are thankful that the Former President, an African Elder and a statesman, His Excellency Daniel Arap Moi and the Moi Africa Institute for bringing us together on this important meeting.
On this historic gathering, I want to register our sincere gratitude to His Excellency President Daniel Arap Moi for inviting the South Sudanese elders to this opportune consultative dialogue. President Moi is a man of peace and the people of South Sudan are eternally grateful for his unwavering support over the last five decades, without which the birth of our country might not have been possible.
His support to the people of South Sudan’s struggle for freedom did not start only during the CPA negotiations; it goes all the way back to1955 when he was a young Member of Parliament and subsequently when he was a Minister of Home Affairs at the time he visited Khartoum in early 1965. After the fall of Mengisto Haile Mariam government in 1991, Kenya under the wise leadership of President Moi opened its doors to our people who were desperately seeking a new sanctuary and our children were admitted to Kenyan schools, a basic social service they were denied in their own country.
More importantly, it was under President Moi’s leadership that the IGAD peace process was initiated. President Moi appointed a capable and determined mediator, Gen. Lazaro Sumbeiywo, who skillfully mediated the CPA to its logical conclusion. Thanks to his wisdom, President Moi realized the fact that the CPA was not inclusive enough to forge unity among the people of South Sudan, and so he decided to initiate South-South dialogue, which ultimately led to the Juba Declaration; a process which incorporated the other armed groups into the then Southern Sudan Government institutions.
On the occasion of South Sudan independence in July 2011, President Moi went to Juba to witness the fruits of his hard labor. We are deeply ashamed that we have come before him once again as South Sudanese in search for peace after we have collectively wrecked our own country and made our people to suffer. We were deeply touched by his opening remarks during the launching of this meeting on the 3rd of June 2015 and we want to thank him wholeheartedly for tolerating us and for belaboring once again to try and put our country back on the path of peace and stability.
I want to assure President Moi that our delegation has come for peace and we have come with open hearts and open minds and nothing will be left undone in this meeting to restore peace and stability to our country. We have embraced President Moi’s call for the elders of South Sudan to stand for peace and we are resolved, as Jieng (Dinka) Elders to do whatever we can humanly to give meaning to the slogan, “African solutions to African problems”.
It may serve this gathering well to mention the fact that as a people, we have always sought dialogue. The Jieng and the Nuer have had series of dialogues and reached major agreements to resolve their differences. In 1999, the Western Nuer and Jieng met at Wunlit village followed by the meeting of Eastern Nuer and Jieng in the year 2000 in Lilir. In these two peace conferences among others, major agreements were reached between the two communities and they paved the way for the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement in 2005.
Although the agreements were negotiated at the communities/grassroots levels, they had positive effects on the political processes leading to the reunification of the SPLM/A factions. It is our prayer and our hope that this gathering would pave way to a permanent peace settlement in our country.
Gen. Opande and the facilitation team,
My delegation has come here to seek peace and the unity of the people of South Sudan. This position is informed by the founding philosophy of the Jieng Council of Elders. The organization was established as a nonpartisan entity with the primary objective of uniting the Jieng people and the people of South Sudan through the celebration of shared heritage, share values, and the recognition of the diversity of our people. If our people were able to recognize our shared history and heritage and celebrate the diversity of cultures and languages, unity and harmony could be the ultimate outcomes. This was our project when our country was at peace.
We are deeply saddened and it pains us a great deal as elders to see our young people die in large numbers for a reason unworthy to take their young lives. Never before in our history have towns and villages been razed to the ground and unprecedented number of people uprooted from their homes.
We are deeply ashamed that our people, who recently returned home from long periods in an unbearable refugee camps, have to return yet again to these conditions. The level of human rights abuses we have all committed against our own people is unconscionable and so is the destruction of vital economic infrastructure in our country.
For this reason, delegates and members of the facilitation team, this conflict must end and it must end immediately. I am aware of the agenda that we have put together with three items on it; one of which is the need to understand the root causes of the conflict. I think we can all agree that the conflict was caused by power struggle within the SPLM. Our delegation strongly rejects and condemns those who try to characterize this conflict as a Jieng — Nuer conflict. The Jieng community believes that this is a conflict over the state power, although our people from both the Jieng and Nuer communities have fallen victims of this unnecessary war.
To prove that this conflict is not a Jieng — Nuer conflict, we have a larger number of displaced Nuers in seven (7) locations throughout the Jieng territory. In Bahr el Ghazal, there are two large IDP camps in Warrap, especially in Twic County. One camp housing nearly 60,000 IDPs is in Man-Angui and another of similar size in Man-Awan. In Lakes State, we have two displacement camps, one in Amongpiny in Rumbek Center and another at Nyang in Yirol East County.
In Jonglei, we have a displacement camp in Ayueldit in Duk County and another one in Baidit, Bor South County. Evidently, the Jieng communities in those locations have not shown any hostility towards these Nuer IDPs. In fact, Jieng have laid down their lives to protect the IDPs from the rebel forces.
The Arusha SPLM Reunification Agreement provides further evidence that the conflict is not an ethnic conflict, as the international media want us to believe. The SPLM leaders acknowledged in that agreement that they collectively caused the war and they have offered an apology to the people of South Sudan.
In light of this brother Gabriel Yoal Dhuor, the Jieng Council of Elders, took the initiative to go out in the early days of the conflict to convince the Jieng youth not to join the conflict. If we had not done this, the ‘Gelweng’, which is the equivalent of the White Army, would have marched to Nuer land in retaliation following what happened in Bor, Baliet and other places and the crisis would have gone out of control. This demonstrates that as elders, we have a significant role to play.
It is in this spirit fellow delegates, that we have come to enter dialogue with you and forge a common understanding so as to rescue our country. We do not take our responsibility as elders lightly and we strongly believe that as elders, we stand for peace. We should take responsibility for the crisis that has engulfed our country and we should seek an end to it. We should not allow other people to settle our problems; we must commit to settle our own problems. We reject any attempts by foreigners to impose solutions on us, but we must demonstrate that we have the will and the commitment to reconcile and heal our differences in our country.
In his opening remarks, President Moi challenged us as South Sudanese elders when he asked us, “what do you elders advise your leaders, or have you taken sides?” This is a challenging question to all of us. My answer is this: we have not taken sides and we strongly advise and urge the leadership on both sides to end the conflict.
To validate this statement, fellow elders, let us work diligently and with a sense of commitment to do our part as representatives of our communities. We should exonerate ourselves as elders by coming up with a common understanding on the conflict and develop a workable strategy for achieving a speedy end to this tragedy that is destroying the fabric of our society. As elders, it is our wish that we leave this country to our children and grand children united and peaceful before we depart from this world.
Part of what we need to do is to build confidence among ourselves and among our people. We cannot reach a common understanding if we cannot talk to each other, if we cannot listen to one another, and if we do not genuinely seek to reconcile with one another. I want this dialogue to go forward filled with a spirit of brotherhood.
To conclude fellow elders, I want to reiterate our gratitude to President Moi and the Moi Africa Institute team for bringing about the realization of this gathering. I want to inform my fellow elders from the Nuer community that we have come with open hearts and open minds and we are in search for peace. Let us make history by ending this unnecessary war. Let us tell the whole world that we are capable of making peace with one another and reconciling with one another as we have done in the past.
God bless you
God Bless the Republic of South Sudan
Thank you,
Justice Ambrose Riny Thiik, Chairman of the Jieng Council of Elders.
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