What a change?

By Remember Miamingi

June 30, 2009 — I am still struggling to understand the short life span between being a liberator and a destroyer. I cannot, for example, understand how a gallant army like the Sudanese Liberation Movement or Army (SPLA/SPLA) who captivated the world as representing the conscience of the Sudan could suddenly turn into gladiators slaughtering and economically raping the very people they fought for? Is this a liberation curse? Does this explain why this curse is not peculiar to the SPLA, but is in its different maturing stages in Zimbabwe, Angola, Ethiopia, Uganda and so on and so forth? Why is it that these liberators end up resembling precisely those they claimed to liberate the people from?

But what is happening in South Sudan is mind blowing. The speed, scale of, and the seemingly obliviousness of the liberators to the raping of the nation they gallantly fought for is very disturbing. One can now understand why Bashir had no problem with the clause in the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) that placed the burden of making unity attractive on the NCP, because he knew, it was only a matter of time when the burden will eventually shift to the SPLA to make separation attractive and he probably knew, the SPLA will fail awfully.

To be fair to the SPLA there are differencies between then when South Sudan was ruled by the jallabas and now when the government of southern Sudan (GhoStS) took over. For instance, during the rule by jallabas, government workers used to go without salary for up to four months, but now they go only for three and half months. Then, the entire country was arabised and islamized, now, South Sudan is just dinkatalised, but still christianized. Then, all our money were stolen and used to build the North of Sudan, but today, Southern Sudan money is used to support the economy of our neighboring brothers, who gave us refugee in our times of need. Then, civil service, government privileges – scholarships, training etc were dominated by Arabs, but today, it is one of our brothers dominating everything. Certainly there is a change; there are for sure differences between when we were ruled by jallabas and when GhoStS took over –thanks to the SPLA/SPLM.

Rest assured that just as there are differences, so also the two eras share some similarities: NCP philosophy was take people to Khartoum to drink pipe born water, Garang said take the city to the people, but SPLA says take people to the city. NCP says you must islamize to qualify as a citizen, SPLA says you need just a mark on your forehead to benefit from the dividend of peace. NCP says we will fight to ensure one Sudan, SPLA says, we will fight hard to destroy one part of the Sudan, so that there will be only one party left. NCP believes government should be lead by indolent, SPLA believes government is easy if you have many incompetent and few competent hands running it.

Why are sworn enemies so similar? Is it fair to say liberating ourselves using the weapons with which we were enslaved surely makes us experienced in the art of enslaving ourselves? Can someone help me understand why?

Remember Miamingi is a LLD candidate, University of the Western Cape, South Africa. He can be reached at [email protected].
The opinion expressed here does not represent the views of any organization he is affiliated to.