S. Sudanese minister welcomes ruling party secretariat post

October 31, 2015 (JUBA) – The new deputy secretary general of South Sudan’s ruling party (SPLM), Jemma Nunu Kumba has welcomed her appointment by President Salva Kiir.

“As cadres of the party, the SPLM, we are like soldiers who don’t select where they should be deployed. If the leadership and the chairman decide where you should go and serve the people, you go and take up the assignment with honour and pride”, Kumba said Saturday.

The water, electricity and dams minister, exclusively told Sudan Tribune she was ready for her assignment, with calls on the various members and the leadership of the party to extend the president the support he deserves to help reorganise and transform the party.

“We need to work together as comrades and as leaders to help comrade chairman with proper reorganization and transformation of the SPLM. We need to put our act and efforts together and work as a team in pursuit of the SPLM vision of equality, prosperity, democratic, peaceful and united country based on mutual respect of human rights and rule of law”, she stressed.

President Kiir, also chairperson of the SPLM, issued last Wednesday an executive order appointing Kumba as the ruling party’s deputy secretary-general, replacing Anne Itto. This comes after party’s National Liberation Council dissolved the entire national secretariat, except the office of the chairman, the political bureau, and the council itself.

The order gives Kumba powers as acting secretary-general to recommend the appointment by the chairperson the new heads of the eight secretariats in the SPLM.

A former govenor, Kumba is currently the head of the SPLM branch office in South Sudan’s Western Equatoria state and a member of its political bureau. She is also the director of Concern for Mothers and Children, an organisation founded by the first lady.

(ST)