The irony of urgency in Juba
By Zechariah Manyok Biar
August 21, 2012 – South Sudanese tend to develop bad habits and cherish them. One of these bad habits is crazy driving on Juba roads. People die every day as a result and nobody seems to care.
This crazy driving is based on false urgency. You find that those who lead in crazy driving are the army, the organized forces, the government officials, non-governmental organizations, and most of the diplomats. Some of these groups are genuine about their urgency, but some of them are not.
The government officials, for example, appear to be in hurry when they are on the road but when you go to their offices; you notice no evidence of urgency at all. Private sectors have also adopted this behavior.
Banks who are supposed to be efficient in their services are not even in hurry when they provide services. One of good examples that you can easily verify is Equity Bank, Juba Branch. When you go there in the morning at 8:00am when they open, only two cashiers always come on time: these are Tellers 1 and 6. But still, Teller one is always slow. Yet, it will not surprise you to find these cashiers wanting you to give them way on the road to hurry up for work.
Others are in hurry simply because they have the authority to do so. The army and the organized forces fall into these categories. They are supposed to be law-abiding, but they do the opposite. They know that no traffic police is willing to arrest them for bad driving. Related to this group are the NGOs and the diplomats. They have immunity, so they are invincible before the law.
Citizens have joined in too. When the driver sees that he has some rights to move on the road, he or she does so selfishly. It does not matter whether or not another driver has crossed the other lens; the one coming straight would still come with full speed because he or she thinks he has the right to proceed regardless of whether or not accident will happen. Sometimes you find drivers causing traffic jam at junctions because nobody is willing to give the other a chance to go first.
The speed limit in Juba is 40 km per hour. In the new traffic safety bill, it is going to be raised to 45 km per hour. But nobody cares about this limit. When there is a space between two cars, the one coming behind would use any speed to close the gap as if having a gap is a sin. When you are in front of a driver and are driving within the limit of the law, the driver coming behind would quickly overtake you and when at your opposite side, would look at you with the expression of “what is wrong with you.”
A society in which law-abiding people are seen as walking on the wrong side of norms is under a threat of uncontrollable lawlessness. When nobody cares about both the law and the other person, life becomes miserable for everyone in such a country. Not only would love among people disappear, the effective defense of such a nation would be under threat because soldiers would lose trust among themselves. They would now think that if one is wounded, he/she would be left alone at the mercy of the enemy.
It is the same selfishness that translates to corruption. When people care about their immediate needs and the needs of those who are under their immediate family care, then public goods become goods of nobody.
It is self-serving that makes people careless about other road users. It is the same self-serving that makes people misuse their power for their private gain.
We as South Sudanese need to reexamine how we relate to one another if we are to build a successful nation. Selfish way of dealing with one another is a sure way of building on a broken foundation. Urgency must be reflected in services, not in driving on public roads.
Zechariah Manyok Biar lives in Juba, Republic of South Sudan. He can be reached at [email protected]