The engine of exploitation: The poor make the rich richer in South Sudan
8 min readBy David Matiop Gai, Juba, South Sudan
January 7, 2017 (SSB) — I saw it difficult to liberate ourselves from the individuals of self-exploitation, stubborn or obstinate willfulness, as in pursuing one’s own wishes, or set free the imprisonments and the bondage in which people of South Sudan are in since the very beginning of CPA in chronic diseases such as corruption, nepotism, tribalism, hatred, jealousy, selfish, envy, deception, war/conflicts, trade slavery, gossips, propaganda, and many others base on the destiny of how people are swallowing themselves on the bases of exploitation. The word “exploitation”, is defined in a similar distinction. It is the action or fact of treating someone unfairly in order to benefit from their work or the action of making use of and benefiting from resources, while the engine operation is like combustion engines are of two general types.
We have liberated ourselves from the bondage or oppression of Arabs from Khartoum, but there are more hard works needed to be done by South Sudanese people in general which are also needed to be champion by a brave man/woman of selfish less life. Dr. John Garang whom I always like to quoted said, “I did not get a man who will distributes resources equally or equitably to people and a gun that shoot by its own”. Dr. John Garang compared South Sudanese people with two impossible things: A man that can distribute resources fairly, a man who can forget about himself or not grabs things for his own benefit, can South Sudan get such people? And a gun that shoot by its own, because men are defined as selfish, and no gun should shoot without human being. John Garang concluded it hardly.
In our history, we know that John Garang took a lead to liberate South Sudanese from the confinements of long lists of political oppressions consists of the social and political freedoms to which all communities in South Sudan have had no way out; issues of Arabs philosophies, Arabs origins of political acuity, Arabs ideologies: like Arabisation, Islamization, smuggling of materials to the north, marginalization in areas of education/schools, Agriculture, health/hospitals, socio-economic and cultural erosion/dynamics, military exclusion, jobs exploitations, and more others, but all these were the pushed to South Sudan African -Arabs war in the Sudan for a long time.
Now we have a country which we have liberated ourselves by our own bloods and materials in one way or another but two more dangerous angles remained as obstacles according to my own observation, and analysis which need our collective responsibility and require accountability to help the President move the country ahead for social development. Indeed Dr. John Garang took the lead and influenced us to sacrifice our dear lives voluntarily for twenty two years; and he is now the Father of the Nation in his absent. John Garang knows when he was alive that we have huge problems: Internal problems, and external problems, and both problems are parts of his death, although he tried to protect the national resources through his blood, yet these looters trying grab, and run away with what they have in hand.
In fact to liberate is to release somebody from confinement, or if you love people, you can set them free from anything that overcome them, and their actions. But another question is who can set us free from flourishing exploitation? And somebody may say, setting you free from whom? And still other can ask me, why can’t the head of state, Gen. Salva Kiir Mayardit set us free from what you mean because he is the head of state? But I can’t attempt to criticize Kiir here. Is it not yet time to criticize Mr. Kiir?
Think of it. Because every human being in the nations have roles to play in turn to be credits to the president. Who have done well that the president prevent of jealousy? Nobody. There are number of inequalities that need to be corrected earlier. There is a real war which supposes to be fighting for than current war of senseless demands. The poor make rich richer in South Sudan. Some wise people think so in term of wealth accumulation in South Sudan.
In the labour market: there is no equality in South Sudan, and I have owned this statement made by Dr. John Garang because I am personally well convinced that although you are given wealth of South Sudan alone, and your time of death come, you may leave this wealth behind without profit, and meaning, so it is better to share resources equitably, and that is the right way of being South Sudanese in this land.
In south Sudan, labour market is changing its different directions since 2008 up to 2016. Twenty two years of war plus five years of new war when the nation becomes an independence state, you know South Sudan is a home of orphans, widows, street children, disables and vulnerabilities, and these groups of people need sustainable economy and development. Therefore, in term of labour market whether in the army or in civil, people are cheating themselves. In army, soldiers’ money is cut. In police, the same thing happens, and reason is to accumulate wealth, or to get rich.
In civil offices, for instance ministries, and national organizations, the grading has wide gaps, while much work done is by workers. There seem like issues of capitalism whereby the richest exploited the poor because the poor have no means of employments so they have to sales their talents and later on by end of the day they earned little money is engulfing the country but this exploitation should not happens here in South Sudan because abundantly natural resources need equal employment opportunity base on categories of our expertise.
In NGOs both local and International, and UN agencies, this is also where the problem is rooted. I have written an article about it in June last year, which the ministry of labour and public service has left serious exploitation on the citizens. In reality, there flow in private companies, and they took over offices in Juba, for example security companies, cleaners companies, and they exploit poor citizens on their performances. I make example with UNMISS, and the companies whereby the company employed poor citizens to work on its behave and at the end of the month, the company paid the citizens with quarter of their salary signed by company on behave of the citizens, and the organization. The complaint and argument here are why the NGOs, International organizations, local organizations, UN agencies employed South Sudanese direct instead employment through companies?
The other factors are foreigners’ nationals who get international jobs or international positions in South Sudan especially in UN agencies, and international NGOs. When reaching South Sudan, and they got labour laws are weak in the country, it’s becomes an opportunity to laid off South Sudanese citizens from the jobs, and create jobs within the jobs which they have already won, especially managers choice as shareholders even though if their contracts got expired, money will still flows into their accounts. This is an abuse to human rights because every human has rights to jobs opportunities. Or maybe if some companies are owned by South Sudanese and pay citizens in favour of their wages, it would be better. This is a serious warning to exploitationists in government institutions, UN agencies, and NGOs that the war we are supposed to fight right now should be on those who are cheating poor South Sudanese, whose economy is devastated for so many years, whether being South Sudanese or foreigner; you are the real enemy against South Sudanese people.
I am serious about it, and this is the area of my fighting, and I will not let down any inches of such exploitation where citizens are work for others and others took money which they did not work for it. I like equality, I should fight for positive costs, and I want to champion over it to defeat this angle of eating styles. Very soon there will be an organization for national labour Board, services, and social delivery system in connection to International labour law and South Sudan national labour law.
Labour unions in South Sudan are not in place, and if it is already formed, it is supposed to seek to ensure that labourers in many different industries are fairly compensated for the work that they provide to their employers. The role of NLB is to tackle unfair labour practices that other unions are prohibited from engaging in. Other roles are equality and fair services delivery to be supervises by the union, quick-service sufficient to South Sudanese by industries, and issues of contracts termination by organizations in a good faith. The National Labour Relations Board in charge of investigating and regulating the behaviour of both unions and employers, those are serious issues of national development, because development begins from one person to the nationwide. God bless South Sudan.
The author is a co-founder of South Sudan Mental Health care Organization, (SSMHCO). He holds Bachelor degree in Social Work and Social Administration from SSCUST, Bachelor of Theology from CLT, Bungoma, Kenya/Kalispell, USA, and a fellow researcher. He can be reach at david.matiopgai@gmail.com
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