I Am NyanCit Arialbeek: The Struggle for Women’s Organisational Independence in Twic East community

By Amer Mayen Dhieu, Brisbane, Australia

1. The Controversy between TEYA and NCAA

Thursday, 23 July 2026 (PW) — On 18 July 2026, the Twic East Youth Association (TEYA) in Juba, under the leadership of William Deng Kuir Bul, convened a meeting at the TEYA Centre to consider proposed amendments to its constitution. Although the draft contained numerous changes, the provisions concerning the NyanCit Arialbeek Association (NCAA) attracted the greatest public attention, not only among Twic Dinka netizens but also among members of the neighbouring Bor Dinka, Hol Dinka and Nyarweng Dinka communities.

The controversy quickly produced competing interpretations. Some commentators claimed that NCAA was being dissolved and absorbed into TEYA while others welcomed the amendments as an attempt to reunite Twic East youth under one organisation. This created the impression that Twic East was preparing to abandon its county-wide girls’ association and adopt a structure similar to those found in Bor and Duk counties, where vibrant, independent girls’ organisations have yet to emerge and mature institutionally, courtesy of the patriarchal leadership of BCYA and DCYA.

That interpretation, however, does not accurately reflect the position publicly presented by the current TEYA leadership or the language of the proposed constitution. NCAA is not expressly being dissolved and not is it being formally integrated into TEYA as an ordinary department. The draft continues to recognise NCAA as a women-led organisation responsible for advancing the interests and empowerment of Twic East girls. The real dispute is therefore not about the formal existence of NCAA, but rather the nature of NCAA’s autonomy and the extent of TEYA’s authority over it.

The proposed constitution describes NCAA as a specialised organisation operating within TEYA, which would continue to conduct its own elections and maintain its own governing instruments. At the same time, however, its bylaws would have to be reviewed and approved by TEYA’s Secretary for Legal Affairs. In external matters concerning the Twic East community, NCAA and other specialised organisations would also be required to consult TEYA, with TEYA retaining the final word.

This convoluted arrangement raises an unavoidable question of whether a legally registered organisation can genuinely be described as independent when another legally registered organisation possesses the authority to approve its bylaws, influence its elections and exercise the final decision-making power over its external affairs?

Institutional autonomy is determined not by labels but by the distribution of power. Calling NCAA an “independent organisation within TEYA” does not resolve the contradiction if TEYA retains supervisory, approval and veto powers over NCAA’s internal and external affairs. Independence cannot exist merely in name while effective control remains elsewhere.

It has been reported that the proposed amendments were not adopted because disagreements arose between TEYA and NCAA representatives during the meeting. From NCAA’s perspective, its position was not properly reflected in the draft, and its leadership had not been formally consulted during the preparation of the amendments.

The resulting disagreement reportedly led NCAA members to leave the TEYA Centre before the constitution could be passed. TEYA subsequently referred the matter to the Payam leadership of Twic East County for further consideration and constitutional review. The proposed amendments therefore remain pending.

This procedural history is important because it demonstrates that the controversy is a substantive disagreement between two functioning organisations over representation, consultation, authority and institutional autonomy.

If NCAA was not meaningfully consulted before provisions governing its status were drafted, then the process itself becomes part of the problem. TEYA, as an organisation committed to women’s empowerment, cannot determine the constitutional position of a women-led body without giving that body a decisive voice in the process.

Women’s participation cannot be promoted through constitutional arrangements imposed upon women without their effective consent.

2. How NCAA emerged from TEYA

To understand the present disagreement, it is necessary to revisit the circumstances in which NCAA was created. During the leadership of Mabior Deng-Wuutung Mabior and Ajang-Ateer Diing Awuol, TEYA operated as the principal county-level youth association. Girls’ associations existed primarily at Payam level rather than as a unified county-wide organisation. In theory, TEYA represented young men and women alike; in practice, however, women were largely absent from its leadership and activities.

The existence of a nominally gender-neutral association did not automatically produce equal participation for both boys and girls in the leadership and activities of TEYA. During the leadership of Garang Atem Ayiik, the continuing absence of Twic East girls from TEYA affairs became increasingly difficult to ignore. Attempts were made to involve more women, but the existence of a single gender-affairs position was insufficient to organise girls from all five Payams or to create a meaningful platform through which they could participate in leadership and activities.

Thus, in large part to the pioneering role played by Ms Aluel Garang Awuol under the leadership of Garang Atem Ayiik, NCAA emerged as a practical response to TEYA’s institutional failure to include women and girls meaningfully in its leadership and activities. Its purpose was to bring together the girls’ associations operating at Payam level and establish a county-wide, women-led platform. NCAA would provide Twic East girls with an organisation in which they could participate directly, elect their own leaders, articulate their own priorities and coordinate their contribution to the wider Twic East community.

NCAA was therefore not created because Twic East lacked a youth association but was created because the existing gender-neutral TEYA association had failed to secure meaningful female participation. The arrangement proved successful as young women began participating in greater numbers and contesting leadership positions. The competition between Ms Adut Mameer Ayach and Ms Aluel Garang Awuol demonstrated that women were willing and able to participate when provided with an institution that spoke directly to their experiences and aspirations.

What had not been completed during Garang Atem Ayiik’s leadership was the formal recognition of NCAA in the TEYA constitution. That task was later undertaken during the leadership of Arok Dut Arok, when NCAA was recognised as an independent wing coordinating with, or reporting through, the Secretary for Gender. The meaning of “reporting” in that arrangement appears to have been practical rather than hierarchical. It generally involved communication, cooperation and mutual support. When NCAA organised an important activity, TEYA could adjust its programme and support it and NCAA could do the same for TEYA.

The relationship was understood as coordination between independent sister organisations serving the same community, not as the subordination of one organisation to the other. What has changed with the current TEYA leadership is the proposed legal and constitutional character of that relationship. Whereas earlier arrangements were largely collaborative, the proposed amendments risk transforming collaboration into supervision and coordination into institutional control.

3. Empowerment or conservatorship: Changes under the current TEYA leadership

The proposed constitution introduces several significant changes. First, the NCAA chairperson would become a member of the TEYA Executive Committee. Secondly, NCAA’s bylaws would be reviewed and approved by TEYA’s Secretary for Legal Affairs before NCAA elections. Thirdly, NCAA would receive an allocation equivalent to ten per cent of the election budget. Finally, TEYA would retain authority in external affairs affecting the Twic East community.

Some of these provisions may be presented as supportive measures. But financial support and executive representation cannot justify constitutional supervision. The central difficulty is that the amendments combine recognition of NCAA’s independence with powers that substantially limit that independence. NCAA is invited into TEYA’s executive structure, but TEYA also claims authority to review NCAA’s governing rules and determine its position in external affairs.

This produces a relationship in which NCAA appears independent when responsibilities are being allocated, but subordinate when power is being exercised. This glaring contradiction must be resolved clearly. NCAA cannot simultaneously be an independent organisation, a specialised wing, an implementing body acting on behalf of TEYA and an organisation whose bylaws require TEYA’s approval. These categories describe fundamentally different institutional relationships.

If NCAA is a department or subsidiary body of TEYA, that position should be stated openly. If NCAA is an independent women-led association, TEYA should not exercise constitutional authority over its bylaws, elections or internal administration. Although the proposed amendments do not abolish NCAA, their cumulative effect risks creating a form of institutional conservatorship.

Requiring NCAA’s bylaws to be approved by TEYA’s Legal Affairs Secretary suggests that NCAA does not possess full authority to govern itself, and granting TEYA the final say in external matters similarly places NCAA beneath TEYA in the decision-making hierarchy. This is difficult to reconcile with the claim that NCAA is an independent women-led organisation.

Since her inception during the reign of Bäny Garang Atem Ayiik, NCAA has developed beyond the limited bridging role originally imagined for it. Under transformative leaders such as Ms Adut Mameer Ayach and Ms Ruth Muka Ahou, it has become an established community institution with its own identity, legitimacy and record of service. It mobilises young women, promotes their participation and contributes to the welfare of the wider Twic East community.

Truly, its success should not become the justification for bringing it under tighter control. Indeed, the more successful NCAA becomes, the more important it is to protect the institutional space that enabled that success. Women’s organisations should not be encouraged to grow only until they become influential, at which point their autonomy is restricted by male-dominated umbrella bodies. That would transform empowerment into guardianship.

The proposed arrangement also raises questions of consistency as a matter of principle and fairness as a matter of justice. Payam associations are important constituent bodies within the broader Twic East community structure. Does TEYA review and approve their constitutions or bylaws before their elections? Does TEYA determine their internal leadership arrangements? Does TEYA possess the final authority over every external statement they make? If TEYA does not exercise such powers over Payam associations, it must explain why a women-led county organisation should be subjected to a more intrusive form of oversight.

The same issue arises when NCAA is compared with girls’ associations operating at Payam level. If those organisations maintain cooperative relationships with their respective Payam associations without surrendering control over their internal affairs, why should the county-level relationship follow a different and more restrictive model?

A credible constitutional structure must rest on general principles rather than selective control. NCAA should not be subjected to special supervision simply because it is a women-led organisation. Any distinction must be justified by a legitimate institutional need, not by assumptions that women’s organisations require male-led oversight, legal approval or political guardianship.

4. TEYA cannot guarantees women’s meaningful participation and representation

Some commentators have argued that Twic East needs only one youth association and that separate women’s organisations divide the community. That argument ignores the historical evidence.

Twic East previously had one county-level youth association and yet women did not participate meaningfully until NCAA was created. The existence of a formally gender-neutral organisation did not produce substantive equality. NCAA succeeded because it provided women with ownership, visibility, leadership opportunities and a platform organised around their own participation.

The same pattern can be observed in Twic East diaspora organisations in Australia, the United States and Canada where women have rarely contested the most senior positions in the general community associations, except where positions were specifically designated for gender affairs. By contrast, women participate actively when they have an organisation that directly represents and mobilises them.

This necessarily demonstrate that simply declaring an organisation open to everyone does not guarantee equal participation. Where historical and cultural conditions have excluded women from leadership, a separate women-led institution may be necessary to create the confidence, networks and organisational experience required for genuine participation. Subordinating NCAA before those underlying inequalities have disappeared would merely restore the conditions under which women were previously absent in TEYA leadership and activities.

Both organisations represent Twic East youth in different but complementary ways. TEYA is a general youth association, while NCAA is a women-led and women-centred organisation, and their common foundation is the wider body of Twic East youth, not the institutional supremacy of TEYA over NCAA.

For that reason, their relationship would be better governed by a Memorandum of Understanding rather than by provisions inserted unilaterally into the TEYA constitution. An MoU could establish procedures for consultation, joint activities, financial cooperation, conflict resolution, public representation and matters affecting the wider Twic East community. It could also clarify when either organisation must consult the other without granting one organisation the power to approve the other’s bylaws or control its elections.

5. The question before Twic East community

The controversy should not be reduced to personalities or presented as a competition between the current TEYA and NCAA leaderships as the issue is larger than William Deng Kuir Bul, Ruth Muka or any individual office-holder. The constitutional arrangement adopted today will shape the relationship between future generations of Twic East young men and women.

The central question is therefore not whether TEYA supports NCAA nor is it whether NCAA is willing to cooperate with TEYA. The question is whether that cooperation will be founded on equality and mutual respect or on supervision and control. NCAA has demonstrated that Twic East women can organise themselves, elect competent leaders, mobilise their members and contribute meaningfully to community affairs. Evidently, the NCAA does not require institutional guardianship from TEYA.

Those who genuinely support women’s empowerment should defend not only the continued existence of NCAA but also its substantive autonomy. If one association had been sufficient to secure women’s participation, NCAA would never have been necessary. History has already answered that argument.

The task now is not to return Twic East women to an organisational structure that previously failed to include them nor to reproduce the organisational Wild West of BCYA and DCYA, where women remain largely without an effective voice or meaningful leadership. It is to preserve the institution that enabled their participation while establishing a respectful and clearly defined framework of cooperation with TEYA.

Ultimately, the future of the relationship between TEYA and NCAA must be founded on cooperation, mutual respect and institutional equality rather than supervision, guardianship or control. I therefore stand with NCAA’s founding principle that Twic East women are entitled to organise, lead, speak and act in their own name. Therefore, I am not just a supporter of Nyan Cit Arialbeek: I am Nyan Cit Arialbeek.

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