Jonglei: Pochala traders now using planes to deliver goods

November 4, 2012 (JUBA) – The absence of roads linking Pochala County in South Sudan’s eastern Jonglei State has prompted residents to hire small planes to deliver goods from Juba, the South Sudan capital into the county.

Pochala County Commissioner Joseph Okello Wello said in an email to Sudan Tribune that a company has been contracted to construct road since 2010 but is yet to make any meaningful progress.

“It is two years since this company started work on the road between Akobo (north of Pochala) but nothing materialized,” said Okello in an emailed interview.

The commissioner largely attributed the delay in the completion of the roadwork to scarcity of fuel, which is also essential for the delivery of goods.

Jonglei State has a notoriously bad road network, even for the standards of South Sudan, and all villages are not easily accessible during the rainy season from the provincial capital Bor. 

In 2007, the Governor of Jonglei state, pledged to construct road networks linking the various counties in South Sudan’s most populous state, but actual work is yet to commence due to instability in the state, insufficient funds and heavy rains.

Currently, Pochala and Pibor counties – both lying east of Jonglei state’s capital Bor, have no access to any major towns in South Sudan or neighbouring Ethiopia, due to lack of road connection.

Only the road connecting Bor to South Sudan’s capital Juba road works all-year around and pledges by the Jonglei State government that road constructing is a priority in recent years has not materialised into action. 

A local trader Omot Kuo Oman in Pochala told a UN Radio, Miraya FM in February, that a 500ml bottle of soda is sold at 12 South Sudanese Pounds compared to 5 South Sudanese pounds in Bor. 

Local residents, Sudan Tribune interviewed, also complained of the increasingly high costs of living, given the fact that goods, which could have been transported by road, now have to be airlifted.

(ST)