By Diu Tut Deng
“There is time for everything, time for sadness, happiness, poverty and a time for having wealth”
February 17, 2014 (SSNA) — The elaboration on the South Sudan Seven weeks’ conflict tells us that the war was because of irresponsibility that means it is a baseless war which has caused 10,000 lives. The war broke up with the ethnic cleansing for the first time in the history, since old Sudan. Nuer were targeted simply because they are Nuer together with Dr. Riek Machar, the current SPLM/A in opposition leader. The president of the Republic of South Sudan General Salva Kiir Mayardit started to planned this senseless war since 2006 and evaluated his planning in 2012-2013 which he found that the presidential guards units was dominated by Nuer NCOs and he has got no way to relieved them one by one since he run his policy tribally.
Mr. President was advised by kinship advisers to trained Special Forces for the target, especially Riek Machar and his Nuer people, Kiir implemented this and ordered Pual Malong Awan and Bol Madut to recruit 15,000 youth from Dinka Rek of Warap and Northern Bahr el Ghazal. The Special Forces were recruited and trained illegally without consent from Chief of General staffs General Hoth Mai who is Nuer and the SPLA Director for training General Thomas Cirilo who is from Equatoria.
These forces were trained in Warap state, the home state of Mr. President Kiir and later transfer some of whom to Juba Lorri the great farm of the President where his cattle are camped and becomes the good private Barrack for Mr. President, this people completed their training in Lorri with nothing in mind except Nuer which were taught to them as the threat for Dinka specially their Government (this is the way they call Government of South Sudan our Government referred it to Dinka government). This came to their senses that if Riek Machar clarifies his intention to run for SPLM chairmanship which provided the green light to 2015 elections as SPLM flag bearer, then Riek would have come and change the system which many had termed Dinka dominant system or Dinkacracy or whatever name you call it, because the first thing in Dr. Riek’s mind is federal system of governance and the liberal democracy which corruption has got no room, which good number of elite Dinka opposed.
The rift grown up within the special army of Mr. President Kiir, trust no one except Dinka tribe which he(the president) hail from, because they only know attentions in Arabic no more Arabic and no other language a person should speak with and engage in friendship with others except Dinka, after the training and their military weapons were brought from Uganda toward the end June 2013 and beginning of July the same year, SPLA spoke person appeared on SSTV announcing to the public that “you will hear sound of the big Gun at the side of the lorri and don’t get frighten its part of military training exercise taking place in Lorri”, this took a full week for firing. In the middle of July 2013 President Kiir graduated his private army privately without knowledge from his Chief or Director of training, he addressed them in Dinka till the end of the program which entourages and the eyes witnesses said and predicted that he was talking about Nuer…Nuer …Riek..Riek..1991… and the new reshuffle was underway.
On 20th– July 2013 he brought 7,000 of his special forces into Juba, most of whom are found rooming at around J-2 and the president’s resident in Hai Amarat and other in Jebel and Southern Barrack. President was well aware that even if he dissolved the Cabinets his army would have to calm down the situation plus the addition of the army brought from Uganda, UPDF, for this reason Kiir gained the momentum and dissolved his all cabinets on 23rd July 2013 included his long served Vice President Dr. Riek Machar Teny where government took number of days without being replaced. The tension had started immediately after the removal of Former VP Dr. Riek Machar because President Kiir was having intension to arrest Dr.Riek immediately after relieving him because Riek had spoken out the weakness of the President before he was removed in position, the Kiir forces instead of staying normally and in synchronization in the Barrack they had incited hatred among the new Presidential guards who are all Dinka brought from Lorri and the previous presidential guards which composed of good number of Nuer who were commanded by Major General Marial Cinuong a Dinka and deputized by Brigadier Yien Makuach a Nuer and the fission comes from the above, from the President Kiir as he was not trusting Nuer guards with him. When honorable Dr.Riek Machar have seen that President Kiir wanted to arrest him, he nullified the situation in the press conference held in his resident urging people that it was constitutional right of the President to remove and appoint his VP, then the situation was a bit normal this took four months from the removal of Dr. Riek Machar on the flaming the situation again.
After the president took a move to held SPLM convention which was supposed to be done in May 2013 while Dr. Riek was still having intension to run for the SPLM chairmanship in the convention after long silent for four months postponement of the convention, then Mr. chairman of the SPLM and the President of the Republic of South Sudan had nothing to silent this Riek with the exception of State powers and used his special forces from his tribesmen to arrested this “ notorious man who wanted to compete me” according to him. On the scheduled date of SPLM National Liberation Council (NLC) meeting the tension had arises and the president in the meeting was dictating his comrades in the party where he had refused to shake hands with Dr.Riek who is his deputy in the party, this let the Dr. Riek to boycott the meeting with his group in the second day. Then in the second day of the meeting Kiir has ordered Marial the commander of the presidential guards to disarm Nuer soldiers within his command of Presidential guards “Tiger” referred it to former Tiger Battalion during struggle and in the following day those who have boycotted the meeting would all be arrested.
The execution of the president’s order was in immediate effect; Marial started to move from meeting venue Nyakuron Cultural Centre to the Barrack and armed Dinka soldiers in the units and at 8:40pm they were done in the rearming while the rumors of the rearming was already detected by Nuer soldiers in the same units but they know where their rifles were in the third store which was dominated by Nuer guards, then one of the Dinka, major moved toward the store and told Nuer store keepers to stay back from the rifles store and said “this is the order from the major General Marial that those in the afternoon have to be replaced by others now”. The Nuer soldiers dishonored the major order and became totally alerted on their disarmament. At 9:39pm the same major with five soldiers came back to store keepers and firing at store guards this was belief to be the first bullet which has escalated to something different now, when the bullets were exchanged the major was killed on spot and the Nuer Soldiers managed to break the store and arms themselves, then the fights were on and the Nuer Soldiers in the presidential guards took control of the Barrack in the first place and the Dinka soldiers with the other Nuer soldiers who thought it should be government fought the mutinies retook from them and then the retake continued till Monday 16/12 2013 at 2:00pm which marked the last withdrawal from the Nuer conflicted Presidential guards.
What happened in South Sudan on the December 15th-2013 was much cleared that it doesn’t qualify the coup d’ ‘etat which is in military doctrine that it should be plotted in military powers not in the political powers; there must be military commanders who were involved in the coup with all their files of their daily attendance for the coup plan. It’s also gives us the fact that the cause of the conflict was the lack of study of the matter and the most problematic was due to the country policy was overlapped by Dinka policy and army policy was also overlapped by the Dinka policy as well as SPLM party is overlapped too and second issue was that the Dinka fear to lose the independence dividend which are only enjoyed mostly by them if there will be political change in the country.
In the context of this provocative war Mr. President Salva Kiir term it “fail coup” in the fact that he would want to gain international support which was unfortunate. After he has seen the lack of international support he begun to planned and used money to cover the tribal cleansing that was done in Juba which almost half of the Nuer tribe was butchered in Juba. Many analysts and other political commentators in the world termed it the killing of Nuer tribe by the government forces (President’s Special Forces) is the “mere genocide like Rwanda genocide of 1994”, but my personal viewed is not like Rwanda genocide simply because, the Tutsi and Hutu had killed each other, but the reality came differently for the South Sudan case, because Nuer were killed in cold blood if it was to be coup those victims have nothing to do with the military coup because most of them were civilians, children and women and if it was to be war between Dinka and Nuer they would have to depended themselves. It was triggered in the funny way to let Dinka massacred the Nuer in the Name of the government disarmament door to door search of guns which is in fact developing Dinkacracy according to Elhag Paul (the system which promote Dinka interest and cleansing non Dinka). I have also learnt something that the Nuer massacre was not from the blue, it was usual system of south Sudan government whenever there is a threat to government from any figure whether politically or, the reward would be the killing to the members of so and so tribe, and the good example for this was the mutiny of Johnson Uliny and David Yau Yau whom their tribe members were massacred respectively and now the Nuer massacre which is overall.
If it happened this way the President will used state powers to dragged down that opposer using all others 63 tribes against that certain tribe which their son/daughter think of to get power as the normal transfer of leadership which is not for one man show. If the state powers are less strong then he would ask for the external powers using state resources such as UPDF for this case.
President Kiir has faced some challenges after Nuer Massacred which he think some of whom have survived his mass killing, and he doubt whether he will be free at the end or not. Then the only best way is to use money to be given to Nuer Politicians and generals so that they would never mind of who died in his/her family members or his former voters and cover the image of trickier tribal war which he has fuelled.
This has done some moves from the Nuer politicians and generals who have received a lot of monies which we called now the blood money that feed in the bad history.The President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda has also received these monies and let the Sons and daughters of the Republic of Uganda to die in masses just simply because to gained millions of dollars of the blood to feed for the self-wealth in the future after losing power. The oil money of the Republic of South Sudan were accrued in the private account for more than six months to used them in the season like this where he has to buy the personal and the group support of the certain politicians and generals such as Nuer Consistencies Representatives to feed on the blood of their people who were genocide intentionally simply because of their ethnicity.
The issue now is on the people who were licensed by their own people to go and talk on their behalf in the South Sudan National legislative assembly (SSLA) as well as state assembly on contrary to the mandate, the legislators has discarded in a surprise disguised the massive death on their constituencies members, this give us clear view that their representatives feed on the blood which doesn’t qualified the honorable duty and lead in to the hell politically. Professional politician fostering good will on the deal for the future credit to his/her owns history as well as the history of his/her own children. Government can change from President to another, one may expect one day, one time to be the superior for the whole century and this comes from what you have done, if your record is so polluted, then it will be difficult for your heir to share the cake with his/her people whenever you leave the earth or when you have come back to the normal class where majority sustain their lives.
Nuer were butchered while their MPs were silent with Dollars and S. Sudan pounds after and before the mass killing in Juba, the fragile situation was specifically on them (the Nuer), none of the Minister/MPs from Nuer sons and Daughters resigned with the exception of the members of the state council and august house who were personally targeted because of their ethnicity no matter how best they were supporting Kiir in the Parliament and in the National Liberation Council (NLC) their all effort were in vain and now have seek for exile. But now the Nuer has bearer the burden already and they had took heart on it. The chains caught the necks of those who will face the same history and those who will beg their votes whenever the democracy is breath in the country. Nuer will asked some questions to their elected MPs one of the time, if they are told vote for me, they will reply who are you? I am so and so, I don’t know you, When we were killed you didn’t says anything while investing with our blood please die out.
When we fought in the bush, we fought for democracy what happened now the Cde, C- in -C and the President of the Republic of South Sudan Gen. Salva Kiir Mayardit dictates people like nothing? This showed that the Party led Government under Salva Kiir has abandoned the core value in which this organization (SPLM) was formed and fought for it in 1983 up to independence of South Sudan. His dictatorship tendencies swayed leadership tribally, which driven the tribal lobbing in ministerial positions to every South Sudanese politicians, and said we this clan or tribe of X were not represented in your government but now if you upheld me to this ministry, we will rally behind you because my people are strong in term of fighting if we fought your rivals. This is the spirit of divided and rule policy which rift the communities and causes annihilation in South Sudan.
Inclusion I would like to urge those who called government of south Sudan our government ( Akuma bi tana,) we will not give this power( Akuma kene, a ca bi gam) that this God gift Land which we call now Republic of South Sudan is not for one tribe neither one region nor one man show, it’s for all south Sudanese and it need democracy which we will see ourselves in the mirror of the good governance , because this will be the only way to get fostering to our Land. The war itself will not help Dinka government or Nuer, I believe the Nuer massacre in Juba and the burning of their houses by the government forces in Malakal, Bentiu will not help and will not make them surrender. I know very well that if the rebel fought Ugandans and Sudan rebels to the last man, yet they will reach Juba if the barrel of the gun will be the solution. For now I don’t see the signs of reconciliation which majority have spoken about but nothing just on the lips, president cancelled it and no more no less.
The writer is the south Sudanese and a survivor of the Nuer Massacre in Juba in miyethaba(107 area) and slept for two good nights with 180 dead bodies in the room where they were collected and roasted with bullets in my elder brother home in miyethaba area and on 17 I was arrested on my way again when I tried to escape to UNMISS for safety but luckily enough I was save by man which I was told later to be Geng Mathuok Gengdit by his former colleague who is soldier with him. But I thanks God that my spirit is still safe. And may God bless Geng. You may reach me by email: [email protected].