In Living Memory of ‘Yaba’ Alfred Taban, the father of the media in South Sudan

WE NEED NOT A MIRACLE BUT MEDIA IN SOUTH SUDAN

By Mayen Kuol Mayen, Juba, South Sudan

Tuesday, June 23, 2020 (PW) — Hovering over our beautiful nation is the spectre of ignorance. From the top of the pyramid to the base, people seem not to know what they are supposed to do. Or sadly what should be done to them. That the nation is breaking is clear even to the blind. What we don’t see is the hand breaking it. Ignorance, like a fog, has clouded our eyes that we only lean on time to heal our misfortunes without ever knowing what hit us.

The euphoria of a peace signed to end the longest and fiercest civil war was soon eclipsed when the talisman, the brain behind the guns that liberated the south and subsequently the birth of our nation, met his end in a tragic helicopter clash. We wept tears that would fill the Nile and bit our fingers in anguish, wishing we would land on the ‘invisible hands’ behind it.

But sixteen years later, the truth is not unearthed. Dr. John Garang was a national treasure, a pillar and an epicenter on whom everyone regardless of his background or religion, naturally gravitated to. What killed him is still a question none of us, even his family, has an answer to. Time will soon run its course and those who did it will escape the wrath of law. Sad!

Up to this day, Nine years after our hard gained Independence, thereare still faint echoes from most parts of the country of cattle raiding, child abduction and unjustified killing of cattle keepers as well as cattle rustlers. Well, I hear you say it had always been so and an intrinsic part of the cattle keeping communities. But did we fight to live in the past and still act medievally?

Certainly no. We fought to change our history. Yet, a year short of a decade, South Sudan at the grassroots is almost the same. And what haunts and hurts is the fact that the spotlight isn’t centred on the shortcomings. Cases of Land grabbing, denied and biased Justice and embezzlement have become commonplace that they are almost accepted as the norm

Even as we enjoy the free air of liberty and the joy of identity, millions of those who bought it with their bloods and brought it to us on a silver plate are either lying in unmarked graves, forgotten beyond remembrance in the national cemeteries or living in the shacks, in the shadows of towers of Juba, with their families havingbarely anything to eat. Others are maimed beyond recognition.

Uneducated as most of them, they’ve found it hard to cope with this industrialized world. Are their stories heard? Have anyone ever care to bend that low and ask a common soldier how life had been to him since Independence? Shall our posterity ever know that our nation was founded on the back of a million thin and ugly soldiers, who gave up their all, and not the smiley potbellied politicians that history will remember? I know, my dear soldiers that a note of thanks is a widow’s mite, but that is all I have for you! Merci! Gracias!

What about the widows and orphans? What have the authorities done to them? And if at all, was it aired on any media platform? certainly no. The media, for one reason or the other, is quiet. Or worst dead! The silence of the media in a nation is like giving the devil a chance to run the world for a day! Too much damage is the ultimate result.

The strength of any nation on the face of the Earth are only two; The Military and the Media. As the first is for warfare, the later is for welfare. It pat the government to remind them of what they haven’t done and Pat them on their backs on jobs well done. As well, it echoes the voices of the mass, their grievances and praises alike.

The media, as I understand it, is the bridge between the public and their leaders. It is the dance floor where one dances as the other watches with judging eyes. And while the media plays its role, it must sit on the fence and tell both sides of the story without any emotional attachment, as that would be unethical and unprofessional. A journalist taking side is like a soldier who cries at the battlefield! 

The ongoing crises in this nation would be halved if the media stood up to the challenge of their profession and do with great bravadowhat is in their power to do. I know there’s a censorship and fear of touching the ‘sensitive matters and people’ and so what? The church baptises with water. The media baptises with truth! And if you carry the sign of Truth, why would you care suffering for it? 

Every nation is built with and by blood. American fought, under the wise leadership of the great Abraham Lincoln, to hold together and the greatest nation on Earth was formed. Martin Luther had to die for his dream to come true. In our own history, millions perished for this nation. So if it is change you seek, then sacrifice your all, even your life, for the sake of it

The liberation war was fought and won by the men of guns. But the war of development, better infrastructure, a sound economy, good schools, hospitals and general wellbeing must be shouldered by the men of pen. There’s no way around it. Tell the people that they deserve a better road and at the same time run to the government and tell them that the people need a road and it is high time they did that. Follow up the project to the end and tell us the whole story.

South Sudan’s media, I understand, is budding. But wait, the journalists have always been there. Walking miles under the harsh sun, enduring the cold nights in the open and dodging bullets in the fields. Some even dying. Against that background then, our below the standard performance must be blamed on other reasons but inexperience. Why, then is the media, in our nation dead?

Before I jump out of my bed every minute, I tune on my favourite radio station and listen to the day’s news. Later in the day after going to town, I buy or borrow from someone the day’s papers and dart my eyes through it to see if there’s anything sensible.

My favourite being OO, I turn to his editorial part and read with great admiration his thoughts, occasionally looking at his bald head in the photo atop and wishing for the day I would see his face and hear his voice. Later, in the evening (before this curfew), I would go to one of the hotels and watch the news while salivating at the drinks I can’t afford, on the days the attendant fails to chase me politely with his ‘what can I bring you?’ 

And the saddest thing I’ve noticed is that all the news are Juba based. To add insult to injury, nothing, especially on SSBC, voices the people. There and again, you see only the…………. what is the point of being banal? We all watch the news, don’t we? Is Juba South Sudan? What about the cattle raids in Jonglei? What about the IDPS depending on the UN, not to mention, the forgotten refugees. What the land lying waste in Western Equatoria? The oil fields in Bentiu? The Kopoeta’s Gold?

Shall we all live to see the day when a story of a refugee is covered nudely with nothing obscured? Or an orphan having the chance to face the cameras, so as, to be televised in the evening? Shall we ever host ex-soldiers on our programmes and hear their stories, as we all aware of the fact, that most of them can’t write?

Is the president ever going to come before the nation and address an issue that was raised by the public on the media’s platform? Questions will run ad infinitum. Yes? Will that time come? 

The Joy of freedom is democracy and democracy is a wheelless vehicle without an honest and direct communication between the parties involved therein, which are, of course, the governing and the governed. And media is the only platform for that communication. And if the platform isn’t high enough for all to see what’s happening on it, then the nation is in a problem. 

Media is not a machine. It is the people behind those machines. It is understandable. They have lives to live and families to raise. They fear fighting the elephants. They fear diving into the ocean with a bathtub, we all know. Here and there, their actions are being watched keenly. Their writings being interpreted to the worst meaning possible.

The law, of late, has turned out to be insufficient. Journalists end up self censoring, when actually censorship is to art what cancer is the body. I better put the pen down! Remember, we are baptised with the Truth! You, as a man is fallible but the power of your pen can shake the gods to action for the nation’s good.

We all have been called. A soldier protects. A leader leads. A pastor blesses people with moral and spiritual values. And a media man is called to shape for its own good, his society as well as saving it from the exploiters.

So noble a calling right? We can protect, lead, teach and shape… absolutely everything. And that is our curse if at all we fail to do everything optimally. Let aside for once your fears and be as truthful against no other standard but God’s

The Nation has come from far. Too many failures and triumphs of course. Our history has taught us that for one day of happiness, there are forty nights of sadness. True right? One Independence, two civil wars already? Is what is next not predictable? Of course, we seek a new chapter.

We have prayed. National prayers. Cried and we are waiting for the national crying. But the God hasn’t cast an eye? Why? All is in our powers. The change we seek is not from above but from within. Our nation needs not A MIRACLE BUT MEDIA. 

It is the media that we tell us the truth about the untimely death of our cult of personality with his ideologies that would’ve, perhaps, taken us ashore. It is the media that will lie bare the intentions of politicians. The plans of the government and however the resources are allocated to reach even those squatting at the grassroots. It is the media that will voice our satisfications and dissatisfactions. 

Either against anyone’s interest, the nation must for once believe in the power of media. And the media must do all they can to bring that new, bright day we all dimly see. Speak! Write! Photoshoot! 

In the living Memory of ‘Yaba’ Alfred Taban the father of the media in our nation. Live on, baba!

The author, Mayen Kuol Mayen, is a South Sudanese literary enthusiast, who is currently working on a novella (first draft as of now) As of now, in Juba, South Sudan. He can be reached via his email address: maydemas14@gmail.com

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