An open letter to S. Sudan Vice President on LRA rebels

Your Excellency

On the 14th of Dumber 2008 the Ugandan Peoples Defence Force (UPDF) together with Cong DR Forces launched Operation Lightening Thunder against the Ugandan LRA rebels who had based themselves in Congo Garamba forest since 2005 from where they had launched repeated raids for looting and abductions in both Congo and South Sudan. The operation although successfully to some extent had resulted in a backlash with groups of LRA rebels making revenge attacks against civilians of the countries being mentioned as part of the coalition against them in the operation. The LRA revenge attacks had been very brutal indeed with over 900 civilians killed in Congo SR since December 2008 and over 120 killed in South Sudan over the same period in Western Equatoria state (WES). By any standard this is a very high price to pay to bring LRA activities to an end in the area if that can really happen.

Mr Vice President

The SPLA have never publicly made a statement to confirm the claimed deployment of the SPLA troops in Congo DR and when the news came out like that a statement from you was released which denied that SPLA was part of the forces attacking LRA bases in Congo DR. Even when it was on the media you insisted the SPLA was not part of the force fighting LRA in Congo DR because South Sudan cannot deploy troops in foreign countries since South Sudan alone is not a sovereign state and any deployment of Sudanese troops or SPLA in Congo can only de done with GoNU or GoS. You further stated that the only thing the SPLA was doing was to seal its boarder with Congo DR and prevent LRA rebel fighters from escaping to South Sudan side of the boarder and causing insecurity problems. This said seal of the boarder however did into seem to materialise as LRA bandits hit targets all over Western Equatoria and even Central Equatoria. But it would be good idea to clarify to the masses of South Sudan the extent of the SPLA involvement if any in the fighting in the Congo DR. This is because all the media continue mention South Sudan as taking part in Congo DR operations yet we have no clear statement from the GoSS or SPLA High command to say that they had indeed deployed troops alongside Uganda in Congo DR. and then clarify the situation of the said deployment such as number of those troops and the nature of their operation against LRA in Congo DR.

Your Excellency

It has always been believed by the people of Western Equatoria that as the chief mediator of the talks between Uganda Government and the LRA you also acted to facilitate the relocation of LRA to WES by designating Ri-Kwanga as the area for them to Assemble. The claim from GoSS was then that the LRA will respect us and not attack our people since we accommodate them and give them food and then we can have security and livelihood and they can make peace with Uganda just like SPLM did. The peace between Uganda and LRA has not worked as far as we are concerned. You can remember that in a series of articles and press releases from 2005 to 2007, me as chairman of Zande Community world-wide Organisation, urged the GoSS to fight LRA to leave South Sudan instead of trying to bring them to the negotiating table hoping that they can return in kind peace and civilised behaviour towards South Sudan and appreciating your efforts for mediating for peace between them and the Ugandan Government. That never worked but nevertheless GoSS continued sponsoring the talks even as attacks by LRA on civilian targets in WES increased. The LRA presence in South Sudan has been very devastating because hundreds of our people have been killed and there were also hundreds of abductions of our people to become LRA forced slave soldiers and sex slaves. Further after Uganda and claimed South Sudanese forces attacked LRA camps in Garamba forest dozens of splinter LRA fighters escaped to Equatoria and went on the rampage looting and killing dozens of people in apparent revenge for claimed SPLA involvement and the number killed reached over 120 as mentioned before. Hence the price paid by Western Equate for the fight against LRA is quiet enormous and we should avoid going back again to appeasing the LRA after the fight ends in Congo DR.

Mr Vice President,
It has now been confirmed that that Uganda will pull out of Congo DR at the end of this month which comes after a week from now and so we might go back to square one again with LRA problem. Any pretext of continuing mediation between RLA and Uganda again in Juba cannot be entertained by WES people as well as the majority of the South Sudanese people. These talks only serve to give safe passage to the LRA to regroup and built up their bandits group and continue to attack our people. Hence I’m appealing to the GoSS leaders and especially the Vice President to cancel the mediation for good and concentrate on the military option. Our people in Western Equatoria have organised themselves well into local defence forces who are ready now to fight RLA whenever they appear and all they need is support with small arms and ammunition from SPLA and they will make sure LRA looting and killings and abductions are a thing of the past. GoSS and SPLA should allow the population of Equatoria a free reign to pursue and fight LRA. The negotiation team of the LRA were people who also had a means of going to Kenya and other countries and as such we see no reason for them to come back to Sudan and claim that their soldiers be treated as friends if we continue to host so called peace talks between Uganda and the LRA terrorists. Peace talks between Uganda and LRA can take place any where in the world and we have nothing to do with it because LRA representatives can travel anywhere. The GoSS and WES governments need to make sure there is a strong defensive line in our villages and boarder areas to keep remnants of LRA away from looting our places or abducting our people.

Your Excellency,

During the SPLA liberation struggle (1983-2005) most of the South Sudan used to be armed to face the challenge of protecting their people and fighting to liberate us from injustice and colonialism. So there is no justification of trying to undermine the efforts of the WES in their quest to protect themselves from bandits and LRA terrorists who are well known for attacking civilians everywhere from Uganda, to Sudan, to Congo DR and CAR. It is common knowledge that the SPLA cannot guarantee the security of anybody form LRA. It is not that the GoSS or SPLA cannot protect unwillingly. Everybody knows that GoSS last year used more than 50% of GoSS budget on SPLA and its armaments and there is little or no money left really to fight the sort of war needed to rid ourselves from LRA which would require platoon of elite troops in every village in WES or Equatoria. The Government of Southern Sudan can help by allowing willing SPLA soldiers from WES to joint their civilian defence groups to go after LRA.

Mr Vice President,

There has been a tendency of SPLA of only allowing troops from some specific tribes to go and claim to fight LRA in WES rather then the sons and daughters of WES or other Equatorians because it seems GoSS and SPLA leaders don’t seem to trust Western Equatoria that much people that much. I would like to assure your Excellency that there is no one in the South Sudan today who can claim to be more Southerner and patriotic then others so that the other tribes are viewed as potential enemies and only soldiers from some specific tribes can be trusted. Such practice can lead to exacerbating ethnic strife in South Sudan and doe work to bring harmony and unity among the people of South Sudan. In fact much better to have the SPLA deployed as territorial armies which can reduce the instances of the brutality and harassment which has been documented recently against the SPLA. Even this month the International Human Rights organisations have made it publicly for the first their unhappiness with some SPLA human rights abuses. A territorial SPLA Army cannot cause such problems since sons and daughters of the area will respect the customs and keep away form brutalising people especially local leaders such like the chiefs. Hence there should be no alarm allowing WES soldiers to move to their areas and fight LRA. We cannot build a strong country by engaging in mistrust. Believe me Mr Vice President all South Sudanese tribes are fed up with war and given the opportunity and the trust and inclusiveness then all will work for unity and progress rather then divisions as pursued by some few individuals who think personally rather then nationally.

Your Excellency, the Vice President of GoSS, I hope my humble views and request which also represent the majority views in WES can be taken seriously by you and we can then find common bases of solving LRA problem for good and bringing peace and security back to the South Sudan and especially WES.
My points are
South Sudan pulls out of mediation between Uganda and LRA fro good.
Help the Self Defence by the WES people to protect themselves from LRA and supply them with small arms and ammunition
In case of inability to maintain SPLA fighting force in WES, encourage soldiers from WES and Equatoria to volunteer to go and fight alongside their villagers defence forces so that we can annihilate the LRA from our areas.

Hence I’m appealing to your Excellency, Mr vice president and the GoSS leadership to try to take these recommendations seriously and implement them and I’m sure the LRA can soon then become history in South Sudan.

Thanks in advance for your time to read my appeal and also for any consideration on the plight of the people of Western Equatoria with regards to the LRA presence there.

Yours sincerely,

Charles B. Kisanga

Chairman

Zande Community World-wide Organisation
London Headquarters, UK.
Tel: +44 7708998373
E-mail: [email protected]