Juba slowly regaining public confidence
By Kor Tot*
Jan 9, 2006 — The action taken by the Government of Southern Sudan in response to the massacre of its citizens by the Egyptians Riot Police in Cairo is one step in the right direction the southern leadership has taken thus far. The ruthless actions of the Egyptians government in collaboration with the UN Refugee Agency against the helpless refugees mainly from Southern Sudan violate International Laws and UN charters. Since President Bashir preferred to remain silence over the killing of refugees who appear to be mostly from southern Sudan, the SPLM led government in Juba has done the right thing by condemning the killing, shutting down the Egyptian consulate in Juba and expelling Egyptians who work in the main southern towns of Malakal and Juba.
Since its formation last year, the government of Southern Sudan has not shown progress toward any concrete step or major development that may aid in building public confidence. Else where in Upper Nile you find a chunk of displaced communities due to inter-sectional conflicts and yet the government of southern Sudan has not taken the appropriate actions to deal with the matter of internal displacement.
Reaching a peace agreement with our foes in Northern Sudan does not automatically translate to peace within our communities. And failure to bring peace to each and every community in southern Sudan would render the CPA meaningless. Part of the reason why many southern Sudanese refugees scattered all over the world are reluctant to return home is due, partly, to the absence of peace and security in the communities they left behind. It will remain practically hard to convince them to return home because nothing seems to be improving since the signing of the CPA.
In an interview with the National Public Radio’s Neil Coonan in Washington D.C, the late Dr John Garang told the NPR that as part of his development agenda “he would bring towns to people and not people to towns”. Bringing towns to people as Dr John asserts would be a smart idea only if the communities to which towns are brought are peaceful and secure. It would be absurd to think that every southern Sudanese refugee would want to repatriate to Juba because not all of them want to live in Juba, consequently, many southern Sudanese refugees would argue that they don’t want to go back unless peace and security prevail in the communities they want to return to.
As a confidence building measure, Southern Sudanese overseas [both refugee camps and Diaspora] want to see unity among the various armed groups in southern Sudan because the more armed groups with no central command and differing military objectives you have the more problems, possibly, conflicts you end up with. The Jan, 06 unity conference between the SPLA and the other armed groups held in Juba is the step that ought to be taken to tackle the security issue in south Sudan. No one wants to see a platform dominated by a particular ethnic group, be it a political or military platform. The more inclusive our military, political and legal institutions the more secure and peaceful our communities and the better chance we have for winning our ultimate goal of “independence”.
Unless the southern leadership in Juba delivers on its promises, brings peace and security to our communities, abstains from culture of corruption, our people will continue to be slaughtered in huge numbers by foreign governments without regard to their human rights and international law and our very best and bright will continue to take up foreign citizenship, trashing their proud southern Sudanese identities.
* The author is a Sudanese based in Overland Park, KS U.S.A. Email [email protected]