New revelation on John Garang’s death
By Steve Paterno
August 19, 2007 — The so-called new revelation by Aleu Ayeng Aleu, the Sudan state minister of interior on the mysterious crash of the chopper that killed John Garang, the chairman of Sudan People Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A), is after all, not new revelation. As such, the episode never generated new interest but rather earned Aleu Ayeng Aleu a boot from his ministerial post—a post perhaps he never deserved to begin with.
Aleu Ayeng Aleu is a person infamously associated with controversies of magnificent scale. He is said to be among those responsible for causing the rift between John Garang and Salva Kiir in late 2004. Interestingly, he was also among the committee responsible for investigating Garang’s chopper crash. But for some reasons only known to him, he abruptly and quietly dropped out of the committee without sufficient explanation only to resurface and try to provoke more public controversy and outcry when the time is going tough on him. Of recent, it was widely rumored that his name is on the top of the list among those ministers up for reshuffle. Like most of his Southern colleagues in the government, he is one of the most incompetent ministers who does pretty much nothing, but roam the streets of Khartoum. Perhaps his removal is the only evidence that someone among the Southerners is doing his job. And that someone is probably Salva Kiir. That is one positive marked for Salva Kiir for at least doing one thing for a change.
It is not any wonder an incompetent minister who quit from a team responsible for investigating Garang’s chopper crash would gain credence by granting a controversial exclusive interview to a newspaper, moreover a Sudanese Arabic newspaper. Most of what Aleu alleged in his interview with the Arabic newspaper, have been in the air for too long, but he made a desperate failed attempt to capitalize on them for his personal gain. The notion that John Garang was murdered is a view held by many. President Yuweri Museveni was among the first government officials to make that allegation when he publicly declared that he could not rule out any “external factor” as a cause of the crash. Rebecca Nyandeng, the poor widow of Garang followed suit by publicly declaring that she knew her husband was assassinated. In all of these cases, they failed to mention who might have been behind the murder of John Garang if he was really murdered.
What Aleu added into this allegation of murder of Garang is that he pointed the finger to the Ugandan government and some mysterious foreign government officials who might have met with Garang in Uganda. Even so, Aleu is not the first official to have put the blame of Garang’s death on the Ugandan government. Ambassador Saraj Eddine Hamid, the Sudanese head of the investigation team, accused Uganda of hindering with the investigation of the chopper crash due to their lack of cooperation during the investigation process. Ambassador Hamid even went as far as revealing that there were some vital data from the wreckage, which were tempered with. In short, Aleu and his former committee boss, Ambassador Hamid, are toeing the same line of laying the blame entirely at Ugandan government. Of course, as expected, Ugandan official rejected any blame for the crash on their part.
The allegation that there might have been extra persons who might have sneaked into the chopper while the chopper refueled in Entebbe airport is not a new allegation either. Immediately after recovering of the dead bodies from the chopper crash site, the United Nations (UN), through its spokeswoman in Khartoum, Radhia Achouri indicated, “the figures that we have, and these are the last figures I saw, we are talking about 17.” Apparently, Ms. Achouri of the UN saw 17 dead bodies from the chopper crash site, therefore, this mystery may remain in the air as the official investigation maintains that the dead in the crash stands at 13 souls including that one of Garang and some other reports are pointing at a figure of 14. Whatever the real figure was, it will be difficult to reconcile the total. The saddest part of all this is that these are human souls being reduced into just figures that fluctuates every now and then through these various reports.
The other allegation such that the radio communication system in the chopper that was transporting Garang might have been deliberately jammed by possibly another plane that was flying parallel in the same vicinity is a probability, but speculative at best. If it was true that this chopper transporting Garang did indeed accidentally crashed into the mountain, then one wonders how could the pilot of that chopper who could not identify the mountain could possibly identify a plane in the vicinity.
Another allegation Aleu made is that the chopper in which Garang crashed in was actually not the Ugandan presidential chopper. He insisted that the original presidential chopper was swapped for a military chopper in Entebbe. This again is not a new allegation but rather part of the mystery on why the chopper transporting Garang had to fly first to Entebbe before it could have proceeded immediately from Museveni’s ranch into Garang’s destination, wherever that could have been. But if the chopper was really swapped in Entebbe airport, it will then puzzled intelligent mind on how six Southern Sudanese soldiers plus Garang would not notice the differences between a presidential chopper with its distinctive features and a raggedy military chopper. This is despite the fact that Garang is among the most intelligent people the South Sudan has ever produced. As to the question of why John Garang, the Vice President of Sudan could still be helped with transportation by a foreign plane as opposed to having an official Sudanese plane, it will remain not clear. But what is very clear is that John Garang, though the Vice President of Sudan, he was not a friend with those guys in Khartoum, but rather a foe of them guys. And that could explain why.
And of course, the other allegations Aleu made are simply not true as some of them have already been proven to be false. One of such allegations is Aleu’s insistence that the pilot, “Col. Peter Nyakairu was previously demoted from his military ranks one day before piloting the plane carrying Dr. John Garang.” Evidence in this respect, of course, shows the opposite. According to Daily Nation, the pilot, “Nyakairu was not demoted but promoted well before the tragedy, a fact that could cast doubt on some of Mr Aleu’s allegations.”
Aleu, though left with no credibility, given his controversial nature, is just right as many people in insisting that the probe on Garang’s crashed must be reopened. He is right to argue that the human element to this tragedy must be investigated, and that human element is complicated as it would include Garang’s behavior, attitude and approach toward the crew of the chopper. Here is a guy who has been in command for years and the language he knew was only the language of command. Could it be that his back and forth confrontation with the pilot and crew of that chopper contributed to the pilot and crew to panic and consequently lost control? Could it have been some sort of physical confrontation in plane, given that Garang had bodyguards in the plane who could have responded to any threat, real or imagine, in a physical way that contributed to the crash? How many people were in the plane and what purpose each had? Such examples and many more would constitute this human element of the investigation. And of course, even the technical investigation needs to be reopened. Even those who are not experts are aware that to have a conclusive evidence of a plane crash, the bits and pieces of the wreckage must be collected and the exact plane would be rebuilt from this wreckage. Otherwise, an investigation that is hastily put up within a short period of time which ignores fundamental factors would create more doubts and questions than the answers. If it is about resources for doing this, they are in plenty because if Sudan can buy brand new gunship helicopters for killing its own citizens, it may as well afford to rebuild the wreckage of the chopper that killed Garang so as to provide a perspective for the investigation.
Otherwise, the investigation for Garang death must be reopened and must continue with thorough analysis. In years to come, Garang’s death will still be a mystery to many people, and this generation must owe a lot of explanation to those future generations, who will have more questions without any lead as this generation is letting the leads and evidence slip by, on their watch, of course. It will be shameful, but there is opportunity to avert the shame.
* Steve Paterno is a Sudanese residing in the U.S.A., and he can be reached at [email protected]