Poignant lessons from the issues of Governance at the IGAD-led HLRF
2 min readMy take on the issues of Governance at the HLRF
By Eng Deng Diar Diing, Mombasa, Kenya
Friday, July 6, 2018 (PW) — If I were at the HLRF negotiations, I would push for either 10 states run by elected governors, or 21 Districts run by senior Civil Servants appointed by Independent South Sudan Civil Service Commission and vetted by the National Parliament.
These Civil Servants will work on rotational basis for 3 years across the districts.
Development Funds should be managed at the regional level (of the 3 regions) with each region retaining 40% of its Resources for paying Civil Servants and undertaking intra-regional development programs.
Inter-regional development will be born by the National Government.
In case of 21 districts, the execution of development projects will be carried out by chief development officers(permanent civil servants at the District Level) and national experts from relevant National Ministries with an oversight role played by the regional caucuses at the National Parliament.
And in case of 10 states, the state Civil Servants in collaboration with experts from National Ministries will run the development projects with the oversight role played by the forum of governors and National and state parliament caucuses.
My view is informed by the fact that the whole war was caused by concentration of power and misuse of national resources by the few who hold and/or have access to power.
Therefore, to avoid the feeling of marginalization by any South Sudanese, development and management of resources should be highly decentralized.
If there is a lesson South Sudanese must have learned the current state of affairs in the country, then it is that a leader should never be allowed to weld so much power to the detriment of citizens.
Incompetency in all its forms and corruption at its full stretch can easily take center stage when a leader without a vision is entrusted unchecked access to power and resources.
To tie this animal down, we must build stronger institutions that are closer to the people so that community values are reflected when handling their resources and programmes.
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