Col. Philip Aguer Panyang’s Grand Manifesto Lack Glue
By Philip Thon Aleu, Juba, South Sudan
Acceptance Speech from Philip Aguer Panyang (PDF)
October 22, 2015 (SSB) —- The eight-point manifestos for gubernatorial contest purportedly written by Col. Philp Aguer Panyang and published by Paanluel Wel blog skipped a vital tool: communication – a significant glue. This is not acceptable for a communication experts.
As army spokesman, Col. Aguer knows the significance of reaching out to the masses to educate, inform and aware them. The other points in the manifesto – security, education, road construction, agriculture, peace and reconciliation, unity, health and establishment of a special desk to channel donations from sons and daughters from the diaspora; are excellent in my opinion. But how would you spread the message of peace, mobilize the masses to support your programs and encourage them to plough their land if you don’t built community radio stations? It will be challenging indeed.
It is against this background that I would urge the ‘Team Col. Philip Aguer Panyang for Jonglei governorship’ to include communication a tool for the success of his some manifestos. It has been embarrassing that Duk, Bor and Twic East counties never had community FM stations for the last ten years. Our people rely on national radio stations which don’t address local issues. (Of course media coverage determine its programs.)
There is never enough airtime to talk to your people if you don’t have your own channel of communication. I hope Col. Aguer will be braved enough, given his exposure as army spokesman, to allow his people to challenge him publicly. I’m made to believe that our MPs, commissioners and other community leader are intolerance to public criticism – thus opted to deny the masses an opportunity to air their views.
We cannot continue like that.
That trend must change. The waves of change helped Col. Aguer to defeat prominent names in Twic East. That tide may be directed against Col. Aguer in the future if he chooses to maintain the status quo. Duk, Bor and Twic East villagers rely on second hand information on issues that directly affect them. The new governor, in the person of Col. Aguer, will hopeful change this. (I have written a piece on how to achieve community radio stations before.) With those beautiful and well-articulated manifesto, failure to add information will be lead to likely failure.
A great Nigerian author Chinua Achebe said “Proverbs are the palm oil with which words are eaten.” And so is communication in gluing several manifestos particularly for a state with considerable level of educated sons and daughters. Col. Aguer acknowledged in his manifestos the role of social media. Kindly expand that to a community FM radio stations. Well informed community is vibrant.
My appreciation goes to the high level civility shown by the people of Twic East county during the selection processes. I hope the counties of Bor and Duk will follow suit during these years of transition. Of course after 2018, real elections must commence in earnest.
© Philip Thon Aleu, 2015
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