South Sudanese Youth: The Future of the Republic of South Sudan
6 min readBy Madol Madol Aguer, Juba, South Sudan
January 21, 2017 (SSB) — Youth is a time in life when one is young. During this time life is full of energy and fitness that can qualify you to prosper in all aspects of life. Raw materials are materials or substances used in the primary production or manufacturing of goods. Raw materials are often referred to as commodities which are bought and sold on commodities exchange around the world, Raw materials are those materials used in processing finished goods.
Examples of raw materials are; crude oil, cane, grains, minerals and so forth. Raw materials can play significant roles in meeting end needs of any company based on extraction and procession of the raw materials to a product that will provide reliable sources of income to the owners or shareholders in that particular company.
That is just small overview of what the raw material is in a business language, but when we talk of raw material in a human context as I indicated it in my subject above, I would like to describe roles that youth in state play in ushering leadership in occupying national politics with less effort based on personal merits as we know in most other states. Youth allowed themselves to be exploited as raw materials by unqualified politicians and that is unfortunate and unacceptable to cadres like me.
I believe in better South Sudan if youth abolish and abstain from that useless culture of unclistism (uncle) and tribal base politics. We believe in South Sudan renaissance through active youth activities all over the country. However, that will never happen if we don’t say no to wrong ideology from our uncles who are there because of our support. Those uncles abuse their titles knowing that you will fight for them in case any rebellion erupted.
We are living in a readymade paradise but due to mismanagement of State’s affairs by the so called politicians we are now living in hell. South Sudan is now known of corruption, war, disease, famine, poverty, mass displacement, oppression and other sorts of man-made disasters. Those uncles are obsolete and they should be thrown to dustbin. Their time is off and our time is now. Politicians have abused their powers in numerous ways known to humankind and I should not narrate about that further.
A leader should be someone that people count on for many purposes because that is what they are elected for. Leader should represent God on earth and that exactly what western leaders do to their respectful countries. People vested in them hope and they should translate that hope through actions barely seen on the ground in terms of developmental projects, economic growth, maintenance of national security, increments in employment opportunities and strategies for betterment of national welfare.
Youth instead of shaping stinky reputation inherited by the so call leaders, they look for means of upgrading the same footsteps by incarnating themselves into mess of looting national resources and supporting of corrupt officials who have abused their powers by embezzling national funds in a chain of uncountable frauds and use the amount of money in buying support from youth to fight on their behalf either in different media houses or physical confrontations when it is necessary to defend interests on expenses of poor majority.
Politicians in South Sudan are less competitive and more corrupt in all aspects of national affairs than politicians in other parts of the world. South Sudan careless about national identity, but care more about building a dynasty that will ensure them lengthy time in the office by forming cliques that will protect his dynasty by all means. They use similar simple methods of keeping youth poor and that automatically happens if means of employment are distorted directly or indirectly by the government.
Directly, known to all of us is lack of government policy in strategizing on how to create job opportunities to millions of youth in South Sudan either literates or illiterates is of government responsibility to ensure accessibility of getting a job for hopeless youth. Indirectly, most of Africa countries have never been stable since the beginning of their independence from their colonies.
After colonists handed over to the indigenous ownership of their countries, we failed in South Sudan to establish strong institutions capable of running national identity and prosperity amicably to meet popular demand of the nations and world respectively. South Sudan failed to learn and utilize experience they had from their whites’ masters in politics and national building.
It seems like they were unprepared for handling national issues such as national politics that is free from tribalism, nepotism and cronyism. It seems like they are trapped in uncertainties of how to differentiate between national identity and tribal politics. Indeed, the so call South Sudanese leaders have the same mindset of kicking out the ladder they used in climbing leadership peak after securing positions they will creates mistrust between youth by inciting tribal politics to keep them busy fighting tribal war and useless tribal ideology promotion.
Meanwhile, weak politicians cling to power for longer periods as possible. Going back to the reality of my tittle “youth as raw materials of power” is a complexity in which South Sudanese youth are being blackmailed by few corrupt politicians to stand behind them and oppress clever majority who abstained from musky system of governing peaceful state without any knowledge of national building. Politicians keep youth busy in fighting tribal conflicts among themselves while politicians are looting national resources overnight and invest them overseas.
Youth in other states have played vivid and significant roles in writing history of their respectful state according to their aspirations. We have read and in some cases as eye witness to other scenarios such as Arab spring where youth stood firmly in the faces of corrupt and authoritarian regimes when level of patience bent backward to defend their national identity from cliques of wolves who have been in one way or another pin down national prosperity on their feet by treating their people as slaves.
Moreover, youth have abandoned following their roles as individuals’ protectors to national presenters in a real sense of addressing national issues not individual interests. Therefore, I would like to say that youth more or less are contributing in failure of South Sudan state by rallying behind few wrong elements who are trying by all means to keep the State in captivity of poverty and corruption cage forever.
Youth must reconsider their relationship with their leaders in regards to their State renaissance. I believe in South Sudan because there are hidden values in this country. Perhaps, we fail to discover our real problem towards those problems.
The author, Madol Madol Aguer, is the acting press secretary in the office of Governor Gregory Deng Kuac Aduol of Gogrial State. He is pursuing Masters (MSc) of Economic Policy and Planning at Kampala University, Uganda, and can be reached via his email: mmadolaguer2015@gmail.com or mobile: 0922202023. This is a personal opinion and does not represent the office of the governor of Gogrial State.
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