Pearson: Londoners’ presence in South Sudan helps a beleaguered people endure

It was the first bold political development of the new millennium, full of cautious hope and promise and it’s now flirting with disaster.

Volunteers from Canadian Aid for Southern Sudan (CASS) were in South Sudan as international observers in 2011, as people voted by a huge margin for the right to establish their own independent state. Subsequently, the Republic of South Sudan became the world’s newest nation.

The mood in the country-to-be was euphoric, but the caution felt by the international community was well placed. It was one thing to form a united southern front against the central government of Sudan in a decades-long war, but would the southern tribes — many historically at odds with one another — be able to hold it together to enable the successful birth of the new nation?

We now know the answer is no, at least for now.

Soon after independence, the two main tribes fell out with one another and a southern civil war has ravaged the country for almost three years. Attempts at peace have failed and the cost to the average people of the south now borders on the epic.

The numbers are staggering. Nearly 7.5 million people are living in desperation. According to the United Nations, three million have fled their homes due to conflict and starvation and are living in other parts of the country. Slightly more than 4,000 are forced to leave for neighbouring countries every day. Six out of 10 South Sudanese refugees are children. Recently we learned from the UN that half of the entire population will face extreme hunger by July.

These are the events we hear of every day through news reports. Yet we rarely come across the remarkable stories of endurance, dedication and survival that occur on an ongoing basis in South Sudan. They are worth remembering.

CASS, of which I’m the volunteer executive director, has been in the Aweil region of South Sudan for the past 18 years. It has never been easy, but amply uplifting.

During that time, Londoners have been in the area helping to rehabilitate former slaves, build public schools, develop women’s programs, offer clean water initiatives, supply medicines to rural clinics and train women leaders.

The organization has been there in times of war and peace, but nothing quite prepared CASS representatives Carol Campbell and Denise Pelley for what they encountered two months ago. Veterans of numerous support trips to the region, they reported back that, despite accounts of bloody conflict in other parts of the country, the Aweil region has remained peaceful, permitting the organization’s programs to remain active and effective.

Such encouraging news was accompanied by some troubling realities, however. The Southern Sudanese champions of these CASS initiatives and their families were on the cusp of starvation.

“This journey was more difficult than my first visit during the war with the north,” Campbell said with emotion. “Those were terrible times, but what made this visit so difficult was to see how the lack of food and medical care has devastated the women leaders we have known from the beginning. It was heartbreaking.”

During Campbell’s and Pelley’s first trip to South Sudan, in 1999, rebel commander Salva Kiir was assigned to protect us, his tough image captured fittingly by London Free Press photographer Derek Ruttan, who accompanied us. Now he is president of the country and his failure to protect his 11 million people from the ravages of war has led to a troubled age.

Yet, his intransigence doesn’t typify the actions of the average Southern Sudanese, who simply want to get on with building new lives and opportunities. The chief pursuit for men and women, boys and girls, is education, and even during these troubling days the desire for knowledge hasn’t abated. The high school completed by CASS last year is full of students despite the chaos in the rest of the country.

But with 800 per cent inflation in the area, many can’t afford food.

Mary Adeng Akot walked with her grandson Garang for two days to ask CASS for help. “I am old. I have nothing. I ask for my family. During the earlier war we ate leaves to live. Now we are eating them again.”

How can all these remarkable programs go on in the midst of terrible, seemingly senseless conflict? The answer is that the Southern Sudanese accomplished all those things for half a century previously during the broader conflict with the north. They not only survived but also prevailed. And they can again.

But can success be achieved when you and your family are on the doorstep of starvation?

Recently, my wife, Jane Roy, and I were asked to make a presentation to the Human Rights Committee in Parliament regarding the stakes in South Sudan. We reminded them that Canadians have been there for years and that millions of dollars of investment from this country have empowered the people of the south, women especially. Should we stop now, all that investment will be lost.

Admittedly these are difficult times for donors, too, including Western governments. And when all the news is negative and overlooks the Mary Akots, it is easy thing to lose hope. But faith in the people of South Sudan, struggling against the failure of their own political leaders, is now more important than ever.

We must champion the champions, invest in their survival, and equip them to lead the women’s development programs.

“You must continue to come to us,” said Deng Deng Akuei, the governor of the region, who was schooled in Winnipeg, with a certain urgency. “Your presence reminds us that the world still cares for us. We still have high hopes that our country will succeed. Your being with us helps us endure.”

And so the call to “be there” continues.

Glen Pearson is co-director of the London Food Bank and a former Liberal MP for the riding of London North Centre.

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References

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