Tribute to Maj Gen Machiek Akuochpiir Chayier Dhal: A Historical Biography of a Soldier, Veteran, & Liberator of South Sudan
11 min read
Machiek Akuochpiir Chayier
By Machiek Machiek Akuochpiir Chayier, Juba, South Sudan
The Birth:
Wednesday, April 5, 2023 (PW) — Maciek Akuocpiir Cayier Dhal, was born in 1958 in Wun-koor, Tonyëjieng to a mother named Ayor Chagai Diirpiny from Anion of Ajiek.
He has his dynastic lineage from his 7th ancestor, Akol Budiang Wengkör Hol. The clan name of his dynasty is known as Pakol, denoting the descendants of a man called Akol.
Origins:
Pakol has their origins from the man called Hol, whose descendants are in the present-day Jonglei and in the area of Apadaang.
His 7th grand Ancestor, Akol whose name Pakol was derived from founded his dynasty in the 16th Century following the emergence of the Dinka (Jieng) in Bar El Ghazal, in the 15th Century.
Akol as an Agro-pastoralist left his original lineage of the Hol tribe of Jieng in an area now known as Jonglei at the dawn of the 16th Century, due to a conflict he had with the kinsmen and resettled in Toch (The Wet and Pasture land) of the people who are present, known as Chiech.
He also resettled along a river next to the mainland to avoid floods during the wet seasons. He named this area Nokdhang, a place where he found no one and met no resistance; Nokdhang is today known as *Pagaraw, a name given by the Turko-Egyptians after the land dispute that Pakol had with a neighbouring clan called Lith. Nokdhang (*Pagaraw) is an area that is 70 miles, far away from the River Nile in South Sudan.
Schooling and the Death of Parents:
Machiek Akuochpiir Chayier was first schooled in Tit-Mayen Elementary in 1964 and later in 1972 Panekar Junior, Yirol. The year of the Adis Ababa Peace Agreement was signed between Anya-nya One and the Sudanese government.
His mother died when he was 7 years old in 1965, a year after he was schooled. Another 7 years later, in 1971, he again lost his father, Akuochpiir Chayier Dhal. According to him and the known narratives in the family, my father lost his mother to an unknown sickness.
The death of his father Akuochpiir Chayier was due to a magic spell cast against him with his class of dynastic initiates by a kinsman.
Machiek Akuochpiir completed elementary and Junior schools in Pagaraw (formerly Nokdhang) and Panekar Junior in Yirol, in the 1970s.
He was later accepted and promoted to Rumbek Senior, where he graduated from high school in 1981. Machiek entered the University the same year following his admission to the University of Juba.
University:
In one of my visits and the conversations I had with my father this month of December 2020, he said that he was admitted to the College of Applied Sciences and his area of focus was a specialisation in Biochemistry. I was unaware that applied science existed at that time at the University of Juba.
Politics and Radicality:
However, due to the heated University politics and the situation of the Southerners, my father Machiek Akuochpiir Chayier started his political radicality in 1983, the President Jafar Nimeiri visited the South and wanted to have contact with the Southern Masses at the University of Juba.
According to his accounts of the riots, he created a moment of gate blockage with a group of other 68 students from other colleges. In his detailed narrative to me during one of my visits to his home in Jebel Dinka (Hai Baraka), a former military camp of his during the Second Sudanese Civil War spearheaded by the SPLM/SPLA.
He unrelentingly said, “I got expelled from the University of Juba among a group of 68 students that I led in a resistance blockage against an Imperial-Communist Arab President of Sudan. Who wanted to enter university premises, intending to confuse the Southern students into submitting to their bourgeois politics, that caused the ills of the Sudanese Peoples.’ He added, “Most of those activists’ youths who protested together with me were majoring in sciences.”
The Future:
Following his expulsion, he recounted, ” I removed to the North (Khartoum); to seek for an external scholarship to the United States of America, which I received.” According to him, he was later conditionalised by the Minister of Foreign Affairs in Sudan, whose last name I could recall as Suleiman. Minister Suleiman told him, “You must seek a letter of approval from a South Sudanese Representative of Foreign Affairs.” He added!
In this case, the “Representative of the Southern Sudanese was Dr Francis Mading Deng, who hailed from Abyei,” A contested area in Sudan today.” My father recalled!
He also said, “Mading Deng turned my request down by refusing to issue a letter of recommendation for the grand scholarship to the United States.” A condition that forced him to leave the North and return to the South following the outbreak of the Anya-Nya Two, later the Second Sudanese Civil War. He made an ultimate decision and managed to join the revolution that would later change the face of politics in Sudan.
Like other brave youths of his time, my father took part in waging the revolution in 1983 with Dr John Garang, who headed the revolution until his death in 2005.
Revolution and the Mission:
Machiek Akuochpiir was commissioned as the 2nd lieutenant in 1983 at Bilpham in Ethiopia. He fought from Pibor in the Eastern part of South Sudan in Jonglei at the start of the War; between the SPLA/M and the NCP and other minor warring parties.
He was a MO (Moral Orientation) member during the liberation struggle. MO was a group of strongly hearted and persuasive soldiers who popularised the movement and persuaded the young and energetic to join and sacrifice their lives for the brighter future of the Southern Sudanese and the Sudanese.
He fought forth within South Sudan and captured many places as a 1st Lt. And later as a Captain, among those places included the towns such as Maridi, Rumbek, and Yirol. These were subsequently captured from the invading Arab Militias between 1995 and 1997. He also fought against the Khartoum-based forces too, in Juba.
Between 2000 and 2005, he was commissioned as a member of the Army Organizing Commanders as he was 85th in the hierarchy. This was during the peace process between the warring parties, mainly the SPLA/M, the NCP, and the minor integral parties unknown in the popular sense.
The Death of John Garang and My Father’s Services:
In 2005, Dr John Garang suddenly died in Helicopter Crash in the Imatong Mount area. Before his death, he promoted my father to Lt. Colonel in the SPLA, a military wing.
Between 2006 and 2007, before his Rib injury that led to his inactivity in the Army, he served in the SPLA’s Lion Division (a 3rd Foremost Division).
In the mentioned time, he also served as an Acting Division Commander in the rank of Brigadier General.
Between 2006 and 2007, Daniel Awet Akot, a then Governor of Lakes State and a longtime company in the liberation struggle appointed him as a Chief Security Advisor in his government. There were unsolvable tribal clashes that needed military interference, in the Lakes States, from 2004 until his appointment. I was in puberty as I frequently visited my father in Rumbek in 2006 from Yirol.
In 2008, my father was promoted to Major General by the current President of South Sudan, Salva Kiir Mayardit. He was recalled back to the Bilpham HQs and appointed as the army’s first Director General of Education. He led the Directorate of Education and Military Affairs in Bilpham HQs. His role was to give directives to the qualified personnel or soldiers who were supposed to be sent out for training in advanced educational programs.
Machiek Akuochpiir Chayier Dhal served as a Major General in the Army in the Directorate of Education in Bilpham HQs.
Treatment:
Due to his health condition caused by rib brokerage, he was sent to London (UK) in 2009, where he was hospitalised at Kings College Hospital, UK. And was later resent to Washington DC in the United States of America in 2010, where he was further treated, operated and hospitalised at Mayo Clinic. One of the most expensive Clinics in the USA.
He came back to his family in Yirol when he had a successful operation in the United States of America. As a Division Commander, his left rib was broken when he fell from the bed in Tonj.
He was taken care of by his last wife, Emmanuella George Kiriako Varsili. A Lebanese citizen with Greeks origins who lived in South Sudan as a humanitarian actor.
He returned to Africa at the end of 2010, first in Nairobi, Kenya and later in Juba, between October and November. He reached Yirol in December, spending Christmas with us (his family).
One of the main reasons he returned from the United States was to witness the raising of the SPLA/M flagship; a symbol of the struggle by millions of his generation; of which he was part and parcel during the liberation struggle in the 1980s and 1990s.
In January 2011, my father could vote with my family and me during the Referendum of Self Determination; in Nyang County of Yirol East.
All South Sudanese who aspired for an opportunity in the pursuit of Self Determination later achieved the dream of being independent on 9th July 2011.
Negligence:
Since independence, my father has never worked with the government anymore. He neither received any appointments from the High Command Council nor appointment from President Salva Kiir directly.
Machiek Akuochpiir never became active in politics until 2020, which marked a period of 10 years as an outsider.
He has been following up on medical processes between Nairobi, Kenya and Khartoum, Sudan, between 2017 and 2019 due to negative factors of mental trauma that he has been going through.
That’s a first-hand account of the brief life of a soldier, veteran, and liberator from me, as his son Machiek Machiek Akuochpiir Chayier.
History of Struggle in the SPLA/SPLM and His Contributions to the Second Sudanese Civil War:
The Sudan People’s Liberation Movement began on May 16th, 1983, as a Junta Revolution; by the first senior Commanders of Anya-Nya One. Following this Machiek Akuochpiir joined in 1983 through the military training camp called Bonga and got trained in Tiger (Timsah) Battalion.
Therefore, after finishing the training, Machiek Akuochpiir was Commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant; Graduated from Timsah Battalion under the command of the SPLA Commander Paul Dor Lampar, who was under the Overall Command of High Commander Arok Thon Arok.
He was commissioned to recruit youths to support the revolution in Bentiu’s first operation in 1984. Following that campaign, he got Injured in Bentiu’s Battle in 1984 and was treated in the Bush.
After treatment, Machiek Akuochpiir Chayier, was called back to Ethiopia for further training in 1986 and 1987 at Kadet Military College in Ethiopia and emerged as the 1st Lieutenant of SPLA in 1986.
He was then graduated and sent to the frontline operation at Akobo in Pibor; under a battalion called Lazim in Zalzal in 1987. He was still under Commander Arok Thon Arok and the general or Overall Command of Commander Salva Kiir Mayardit.
He Captured Pachalla and Pibor with his revolutionary comrades in 1987, under Saria of Lazim Battalion in Zalzal; where he was a Deputy Taskforce Commander.
Machiek Akuochpiir was then sent to Bhar el Gazal mission in 1988 to liberate areas such as Yirol, Rumbek and Tonj under Commander Daniel Awet Akot and the Overall Command of Commander Bona Bang.
After their first Battles in Bhar el Gazal, they started a Mission Campaign named Kon Anok under the General Command of Gen. Salva Kiir Mayardit in 1988 and 1989, the whole mission or battles were known to have failed, because of enemy strength or problems with command.
Major. Gen. Machiek Akuochpiir Chayier then led a Major military operation in Maridi in the years 1990 and 1991, in which he captured the area from the enemy under the command of Commander John Koang Nyuol and General Command of Dr. John Garang as a Joint Operation, direct Alternate Commander A/Cdr of attack in Maridi in 1990 was Machiek Akuochpiir, and the Deputy Capt. Magok Magok.
In this Maridi operation of 1990 and 1991, the Enemy Parate was 17000 troops of Sudan Army Forces, which they believed was second to Juba in Military Strength of the Enemy. But they heavily defeated them.
He was also assigned to lead an operation called; Operation JUNGLE STORM in 1992 in Juba-Mondri road and Jebel-Luri as he was Commanding SOUTH/WEST of JUBA at a request from the High Command.
After their success in capturing the areas mentioned above, Machiek Akuochpiir was assigned and then sent by Commander-in-Chief, Col. Dr. John Garang de Mabior, to OPERATION DENG NHIAL in 1992, comprising places or towns such as Yirol and Tali as the 3rd targets to chase the enemy or SAF out in 1997, and 2nd target was Rumbek in 1996, then Tonj was the 1st town that they captured in this operation in the years 1996 to 1997 after many attempts in 1992.
After having succeeded in Operation Deng Nhial, in 1992, 1996 and 1997, in places such as Tonj, Rumbek, and Yirol-Tali, respectively; His forces went as MOBILE FORCE REINFORCEMENT to Juba; Commanded by Daniel Awet Akot and himself, Machiek Akuochpiir Chayier.
Maj. Gen. Mahciek Akuochpiir was sent to Jubal Rogo, Kajo Keji Juba Road, as an Overall Commander, in 1997. He continued to clear Central Equatoria, Yei, Marobo over 40 miles from the enemy; through OPERATION THUNDER VOLT (OTV).
When they defeated the enemy in ways that led out from Juba, which is the headquarters of the Equatoria region, that remained uncaptured during the war because of heavy deployment of government forces; he returned to Bhar el Gazal where he was stationed with his forces from 1998 until the year 2003.
Commander Col. Machiek Akuochpiir then removed to Yirol after having moved back and forth as a Commander of the forces in towns and the areas already captured; including Yei, Maridi, Yirol and Rumbek between 1998 and 2004 when Dr. John Garang visited Yirol and Rumbek following the peace negotiations that led to the signing of Comprehensive Peace Agreement in Naivasha Kenya on 9th January 2005 between the SPLA/M and Sudanese Government under the National Congress Party ( NCP).
In these times, Maj. Gen. Machiek Akuochpiir was under Colonel since his first promotion to the Military High Command of the SPLA/M in 1995.
In conclusion; According to the revolutionary manifesto of the SPLA/M; they fought for the values of attaining UNITY, EQUALITY, and PROGRESS in the 20th Century. Gen. Salva Kiir’s Regime has forgotten those great men like Maj. Gen. Maciek Akuocpiir and many veterans in the 21st Century after many decades of fighting for equality under oppressive regimes in Khartoum, Sudan.
Author’s Notes: This brief note is a tribute and an account of my father’s life from birth, origins, and his services in the liberation struggle. It will be expandable in time, as shared with PaanLuel Wël Media Ltd.
Machiek Machiek Akuochpiir Chayier is a writer interested in History, Philosophy, Science and Technology. He can be reached through machiekmachiek@protonmail.ch or machiekmachiekakuocpiir@gmail.com for any commentary or request for a citation about the historical and biographical accounts of Maj. Gen. Maciek Akuocpiir Cayier lives in Juba South Sudan in the Present Day, you may reach out to Machiek Cayier for more information and how you can reach Maj. Gen. Maciek Akuocpiir Cayier, if you’re a documentary journalist or a historical writer.
If you want to submit an opinion article, commentary, or news analysis, please email it to the editor: info@paanluelwel.com or paanluel2011@gmail.com. PaanLuel Wël Media (PW) website does reserve the right to edit or reject material before publication. Please include your full name, a short biography, email address, city, and the country you are writing from.
About Post Author
