Press statement from the office of VP James Wani on his visit to Eastern Nile state
6 min readDavid Mayen Ayarbior, Press Secretary in the office of the VP
June 19, 2016 (SSB) — On Thursday June 16 the Vice President, H.E. James Wani Igga made a short two-day visit to Easter Nile State. The main purpose of the visit was to brief the population about implementation progress in the peace agreement as-well-as to acquaint himself with the overall economic environment in the state. His high level delegation included the (Federal) Minister of Finance Hon. Deng Athorbei, (Federal) Minister of Trade Hon. Stephen Dhieu Dau and the Governor of Eastern Nile State Hon. Chol Thon, among others.
VP’s tight programme included visiting Palog oil fields and processing facilities, briefing the population of Palog, traveling to Renk where he made a field visit to a farm, food stores, gum Africa processing facility, and briefing the population. As all of the above is by now public knowledge since it was reported by media outlets, I would like to make the following observations about lessons we may learn from the visit and some policy recommendations.
In spite of contributing about 120,000 (a hundred and twenty thousand) barrels of crude oil to South Sudan’s economy, the population of Palog are surely among the retched of the earth. Palog itself is a densely populated slum-village (not town) which lacks the very basics of services. I have never seen a single concrete structure, school, hospital or borehole. I am sure few of them must be there somewhere, but the fact that we could not see them means that they are too few. The giant ghetto called Palog does not have electricity despite big grids passing across vast fields to extend 24 hour electricity to oil facilities and the big luxurious “VIP” guest house where we stayed.
I had mixed feelings about being considered a “VIP” by association when the owners of the money that built that guest house who just stay across the road lived in darkness, complained about high rates of abortions and defective births due to high radiation from byproducts of crude oil. And although that unenviable status was caused by the oppressive regimes of Khartoum against which we and our ancestors valiantly fought for centuries, the picture after “liberation” could be anything but resembling a liberated lot of countrymen, women and children after eleven years of self-rule. Something must be urgently done by GoSS in terms of liberating the retched people of Palog from the heavy enslaving yoke of unscrupulous oil companies. This is THEIR country and their oil.
Recommendation: The concept of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has become well entrenched in international business and contracts. It has arguably become the most important clause in all international contracts governing the field of extractive industries. It often includes setting aside a percentage of profit accruing to foreign firms for building social and physical infrastructure for inhabitants of host communities and beyond. Much of that contractual obligation (the percentage) is not paid in cash but in kind (tangible infrastructure). In this regard, since there has been another safer place (New Palog) allotted for relocating the beleaguered people of Palog, oil companies should be made to urgently facilitate such relocation by building a few (two or three) hospitals and schools in New Palog to entice people to resettle there.
In fact, oil firms should be made to build not less than two thousand 4 by 4 rooms and one toilet in each of two thousand plots of land as a nucleus for urban settlement- just for a start. Losing a hundred and twenty thousand barrels of crude oil per day is too much a bargain for any consortium of oil firms in the world to contemplate over. And for the people of Palog, that would be a fair compensation they should get for positively contributing to the GDP of South Sudan and some other big countries.
In terms of our visit to Renk, as a first time visitor I was impressed by the high level of urbanization enjoyed by the population. For some reason, I did not expect Renk to be such a huge well designed town, with many concrete and fenced houses, wide roads, 24 hour power supply from two hydropower dams (Ruseris and Damaziin) from Sudan. Against all odds and for some strange reason the Khartoum government extended concrete electricity grids all over the town, making its inhabitants enjoy constant power supply, even by residents of huts.
Moreover, the people of Renk could be the most industrious in South Sudan. Every year, they prepare over two million fadans from their vast agricultural fields. Over many decades, Renk farmers have again and again demonstrated that they have accumulated adequate experience in successfully managing the agricultural cycle up until harvesting and storage. The only thing that is discouraging them to increase their agricultural output is finding markets. Thousands of expired bags of sorghum in the Agricultural Bank’s stores are regularly destroyed, even after many thousands are sold to Blue Nile State in Sudan across the border. The famers were visibly disillusioned as they complained of lack of government input in terms of pest’s control, provision of grants for buying water pumps, seeds and fertilizers.
Recommendation: Palog airport has a reasonably well built runway which may receive big planes, but it is mostly used by oil companies, while the poor population around who cannot afford the basics of decent living just watch planes landing and taking off. Let GoSS “force” the oil companies to prioritize construction of a paved road from Renk to Palog so that big cargo planes could be used to air lift food and Gum Africa produced in Renk. This could (should) be one of the few strategic plans to be tagged “urgent” and may be overseen by the ‘Presidential trilogy’ itself, since river transport has become hazardous and may be so for some time.
In conclusion, even if the trip to Eastern Nile State has been a relative success, it would be even more so if follow ups are made. The Vice President has pledged five million pounds for school construction in (New) Palog and promised the farmers of Renk that he will personally make sure that their challenges are addressed by Juba. But one hand cannot clap. Ministers and technocrats should be the foot soldiers of economic progress targets and projects. Let them be used, for agriculture is not practiced in offices.
To me, because of the huge quantity of oil and agricultural output of the state, there is no doubt whatsoever that Eastern Nile State is THE economic heart of South Sudan which needs resuscitation in order for a real take-off into economic growth to start. The key word is: urgently.
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