Calls for 15 December to be declared day of mourning
December 11, 2014 (ADDIS ABABA) – Leaders and representatives of Nuer youth groups around the globe have signed an open petition to President Salva Kiir and his rival Riek Machar, calling on both warring parties to declare 15 December a Mourning Day throughout South Sudan and beyond.
In a statement signed on 10 December by youth representatives in Africa, Europe, Australia and America, the document stressed that observing the day would be in paying respect to the tens of thousands of souls “senselessly” lost starting with a massacre from 15 December in the capital, Juba.
“We, the Nuer youth leaders and representatives in South Sudan and in Diaspora are calling on the two South Sudanese rival leaders, President Salva Kiir Mayardit and SPLM/SPLA Chairman, Dr. Riek Machar Teny, to recognise 15 December as a National Mourning Day,” partly reads the statement seen by Sudan Tribune.
“We want the two leaders to decree to commemorate the day in their respective areas of control and to continue to do so after a peace agreement is signed and a Transitional Government of National Unity (TGNU) is formed,” it adds.
Observing the “dark day”, the statement further argued, would send a strong message of reconciliation across the war torn young nation.
The gesture, they said, would trigger South Sudanese youth to commit themselves to educating communities, particularly the youth sector in the society about the consequences of the post-independence violence and the need to stop the war, initiate reconciliation and heal the wounds and rebuild the country.
It said the day would also be used to remind all South Sudanese and young politicians “not to be bias and to discourage tribalism, hatred, corruption and dictatorship or not commit crime against their own citizens”.
The statement calls on South Sudanese youth to study the genesis of the crisis with the aim to avoiding future repeat of the calamity, adding that it would also be a “turning point” in which the army and other security organs would be transformed and educated not to ever again turn their guns on innocent civilians.
The youth further expressed hope that the 15 December war would be the last internal war among the South Sudanese people and that measures shall be taken to avoid such deadly experience in the future.
They however vowed to continue to sacrifice more lives in eradicating “dictatorship” and defending freedom and justice for all should the South Sudanese leadership not sign and implement a meaningful peace agreement.
VICTIM FOUNDATION
The Nuer youth worldwide have also agreed to establish a foundation that would support victims of the 15 December massacre and beyond.
“We would also like to announce that we the Nuer youth have resolved to establish a 15 December Victim Foundation, a non-profit organisation that shall be providing support and services such as counselling, advocacy, collection of data of all Nuer victims who lost their lives in Juba and beyond, and to support orphans and widows,” says the statement.
The activities of the organisation would take place concurrently with the would-be initiated reconciliation process in South Sudan.
(ST)