Who owned Malakal town: Jieeng or Chollo?
Which community truly lived first in the village now turned into a great town of Malakal?
By Kuol K. Alberto, Juba, South Sudan
April 7, 2016 (SSB) — The history of this nation is indeed shrouded in controversy and unclear information. Everything seems distorted to the favor of whoever is reporting it. Could that be the case with the author of this article? It is obvious that by the time this generation is over from the face of this earth, if we are to look back at what the generation after is saying about other known facts now, it would completely be a different story. Why, what is the problem? We have become so naïve and foolhardy so much so that we don’t strain to get the facts but rather rely on hearsays, attachments and favoritism. Now these traits are very dangerous and misleading. Facts are twisted in this country and all we get at the end of the tunnel is something that you would take for truth at your own risk. Only a misguided person would senselessly take any information just for granted.
Now, what can we say about Malakal town of the former Upper Nile state which happened to be the state’s headquarters. We have differing information depending on who you talk to when inquiring about this historical town. If you request for this information from the view point of the Chollo, all you get to know is that right from the beginning, it is a Chollo village which by luck happened to be the province’s headquarters. That it actually used to be the headquarters of their King and this is why they say the proper name for the town is Makal and not the way it is famously known now. Makal according to the Chollo is the shrine for the king. This could be proved by the huge population of the Chollo people in and around the town. Remember they have many representatives at the national assembly from within and around Malakal.
The Ngok/Jieeng of the then Upper Nile State have their own story regarding the true inhabitants of this village. They claim the ownership saying this could be proved from the name itself (Mal akal) which means in Jieeng vernacular “the calf got tired.” The story was that, this community being a pastoralist community and as we all know the nature of cattle keepers who are fond of moving from one location to the other, it was on one of these journeys that the calf got tired to walk no longer and where they stopped happened to be called Malakal- the place where the calf got tired. Of course, it could not have been one calf but several of them I supposed. They do have quite a huge population as well in Malakal and the nearby Baliet County.
With all these justifications from both sides, one cannot easily dismiss the opinions being expressed by these groups. This brings me to the following activities which I will discuss one by one: analysis and synthesis a compromise (which is the best option for peaceful coexistence of these ethnic groups).
If one is familiar with how the Chollo counties are, where Malakal is and where the Ngok Dinka are, one would agree with me that, on the western side of the Nile are the Chollo villages and towns. And on the eastern side of the Nile are the Ngok villages and towns. Malakal happens to fall at the Eastern side, therefore, logically it belongs to the Ngok Dinka. The fact that it grew and became populous to have many Chollo could easily be attributed to the fact that it was a town and as we all know, a town is inhabited by many people. The Chollo people happened to be the majority because during the war of liberation, most of the Jieeng were the target of extinction from various NIF regimes and therefore many of them left for bush and as such their places where inhabited by the Chollo whose majority of their members happened to be collaborators with the Arabs. This is a simple logical conclusion that could be drawn out of this dramatic situation.
Malakal could as well belong to the Chollo because historically the Jieeng people came from the East and as they were entering Sudan, they started pushing to the West the real inhabitants of the present areas being inhabited by the Dinka. Those that used to be in southern Sudan by then were Jurlueel who are the Luos (Chollo, Luos etc). With this in mind, Malakal could have been established by the Chollo people but with the coming of the Jieeng they were dislodged to the other side of the Nile and because of the respect for the shrine, they (Jieeng) did not interfere with it and as such the King and his priests of the Chollo used to come back and perform rituals in Malakal. When relations normalized, they started coming back one by one and again filled up the whole village. This could be proved as well from the simple fact that, a tiny group among the Ngok Dinka crossed the Nile and settled in Pigi on the South West of the Nile.
To make a synthesis out of this situation, I must say nobody can say with absolute clarity what truly transpired back then. Nobody would be bold enough to dismiss the other group from Malakal. They two communities own this land. They have lived in this land for centuries and they should not allow outsiders to disenfranchise their peaceful coexistence.
The best way forward for the two communities now that the government had deliberately given the upper hand to one community is to accept the reality and forge a moderate way to live as before. This is by ensuring that those who are now curved out as Western Nile State should accept this and develop this great area. Those Chollo people in and around Malakal are inhabitants of Malakal town and should be considered as Eastern Nile state inhabitants and given the rights they deserve as citizens of the state. Otherwise, rejecting this would raise several questions for instance, was the division of states tribal? Of course not. Indeed there are states which happened to have one ethnic community that is not the case for all.
For instance, Wau state, has Jieeng, Fertit (which has more than 10 ethinic groups) and the Luos. Lol state has Jieeng and elements of Fertit. Jubek State has Nyangwara, Bari, Kakwa, Madi etc. Is the division meant for domination of other ethnic groups? No. Otherwise, when Malakal was the headquarters for Upper Nile and supposing that it was Chollo land, did the Chollo dominate over the town and other people? No. The reality here now is that, Eastern Nile State will have Shilluk as the minority group.
There is no way we can have towns predominantly from one ethnic community. The unity of this country depends on our diversity. The more we accept each other the better this nation will be. And therefore this brings me to the question of whether asking the question of who are the owners of Malakal would be the right question. The right question should be how the inhabitants of Malakal should live together.
You can reach the author via his email: kuolkuol2001@yahoo.com
The opinion expressed here is solely the view of the writer. The veracity of any claim made are the responsibility of the author, not PaanLuel Wël: South Sudanese Bloggers (SSB) website. If you want to submit an opinion article or news analysis, please email it to paanluel2011@gmail.com. SSB do reserve the right to edit material before publication. Please include your full name, email address and the country you are writing.
About Post Author
