South Sudan probes beating of senior official in Wau

January 2, 2012 (JUBA) – South Sudan said Monday it is investigating an allegation of assault against a senior official in the national government by forces believed to have been from the new nations military.

An armed group, allegedly members Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA), beat up Jok Madut Jok, an undersecretary in the country’s ministry of culture, at Wau airport on 31 December, Sudan Tribune has been told.

South Sudan, which became independent in July, has a checkered human rights record with journalists and the country’s top UN human rights official being badly beaten by security forces in 2011.

The attack on the senior official, occurred when he arrived at Wau airport from Juba, on the same day that President Salva Kiir was passing through on the way back from his Christmas holiday in his home state of Warrap.

The reason for the attack is unclear. The Western Bahr el Ghazal state minister of information was not able to give Sudan Tribune an explanation.

Akot Mayen, a resident of Wau, told Sudan Tribune on Sunday that witnessed soldiers wearing SPLA uniform beating up Jok outside the airport.

“I was surprised when I saw Professor Jok Madut Jok being beaten and wrestled down by a group of soldiers yesterday. I thought he had committed a crime that would warrant military intervention […] I was not expecting that the soldiers could mercilessly beat him like the way I saw it considering that he is a senior government official”, he explained.

In a statement to Sudan Tribune on Sunday Jok remarked that the incident showed the was “no freedom” in South Sudan despite the country gaining independence from north Sudan in July.

Decades of civil war, in which 2 million died and 4 million were displaced, led to South Sudan’s secession as part of a 2005 peace deal.

Jok said he arrived in Wau on Saturday morning hoping to celebrate New Year’s Eve with his family but was attacked by SPLA soldiers before he could enter the car his two brothers had come in to collect him.

The official said he believes that he was beaten up by the SPLA soldiers, who were supposed to be securing the airport, as his arrival coincided with the time when the President was expected to land from his Christmas holiday in Akon.

“I was brutally attacked, my arms tight by several men, a blow to the side of my head with the butt of a gun and several punches straight onto both of my eyes, no questions asked, not even any accusations of wrong doing.”

Jok said that he tried to show “the soldiers my identity card, demonstrating that I am a senior official in the national government, undersecretary in the Ministry of Culture, and the ID was thrown away and several men wrestled me to the ground.”

The solders were operating a “torture first” policy, without asking any questions, leaving Jok with a “bloodied eye, bruised face and a concussion”, he said.

“I was left shocked and in pain, but I was eventually let go, no explanation, no apologies. So the physical pain was unbearable, but it was nothing compared to the pain in the soul of a citizen, whose travels abroad and the abuses we encountered in Foreign countries were all endured because of the dream of a homeland, a free one such as do have now”, he said.

He argued that it was ironic that the SPLA could do this to one of its own people having fought so long for the freedom to be an independent nation.

The physical pain and the humiliation bore no weight, he said, compared to disillusionment that this was the country he had “yearned for all my life”.

“It is especially painful and worrying that it all unfolded right in front of army officers forming a jeering spectator of my abuse, of a civilian being treated worse than one of those thieving dogs that the entire neighborhood wants to kill.

“And here I was, someone who is supposedly their colleague in the service of the same nation these soldier work for, appointed by the same president they were supposedly protecting. With the responsibility of a senior civil servant, I was being hit, kicked, called a ‘traitor from Khartoum’,” he said.

He claimed that he did not fight back out of respect for the uniform of country’s army, as it was an emblem of sovereignty but that the soldiers read this as “cowardice or weakness”.

Jok said he expects that “all of this will probably be investigated and apologies will be issued, but nothing will take the pain away.”

“If this sort of thing happens to a senior government official, what we should imagine happens to ordinary citizens”, he asked.

He observed that while seated on the floor, being interrogated, several soldiers who he believed to be drunk, repeatedly interrupted their officer. However, instead of reprimanding them, Jok says that the officer told him “you see, they may be drunk, but that is how we liberated this country.”

Jok concluded his statement to Sudan Tribune by saying:

“There is that phrase, so commonly used as justification for misconduct. We liberated it is now thrown in your face left and right, even if it means taking the liberty to be drunk on the job, loot public property, claim entitlement for a job one is not qualified for, beat or even shoot to kill civilians over nonsense.”

(ST)