Home Grown Peacekeeping Strategies in the Republic of South Sudan - Sudan Vision

I am ever feeling extraordinarily wary for the safety of peace in the RoSS. To most if not all of South Sudanese, the Republic of South Sudan (RoSS) is akin to a living organism. The peoples of the RoSS have given birth to the RoSS; and it has rightfully come to them now; and surely, they would like to sustain it forever; our individual and group happiness and life chances depend upon its longevity. The RoSS is a very expensive and valuable creature. It has cost many South Sudanese lives to achieve it, and there is an urgent need for all the peoples of South Sudan to begin making plans as to how to create their own national peacekeeping strategies and mechanisms, so that, the peoples of South Sudan; do not encourage others with hidden agenda; to come to the RoSS; and pretend to keep the peace for us. The peoples of the RoSS are a grown up peoples. The peoples of the RoSS; and with their brothers and sister in the other hitherto united Sudan; decided to end the war in South Sudan, because; they have come to the realisation that, they were wasting human and other resources over issues that can be resolved without firing a single bullet from an AK47 and such like.

Therefore; the peoples of the RoSS have come such a long way that, it will be shameful if some human factor contributed to peace running away from them within the remit of the nascent RoSS, because; the RoSS is such a volatile country that, peace finds it extremely impossible to reside in our midst. When I say there is a need for national peacekeeping, one is not meaning peacekeepers with heavy weaponry. I mean that, the South Sudanese both inside and outside the country; and in various current rebel movements; must be morally committed to the sustenance of peace, and they ought to work hard to keep it alive, and among us by providing this peace with all the ingredients that shall concretised it, while at the same time, spreading its beneficial effects throughout the nation. This is the sanguine hope of the nascent nation of the RoSS; and the peoples therein. However, I am wary because, while many peoples in the RoSS; and few others in the government of the RoSS; may be keen to keep this peace alive, however; others in the same government in the RoSS; plus others in the current rebel movements in the RoSS; may be playing a dangerous game that might not be in the interest of peace, and that of the entire peoples of South Sudan.

The problem with prolonged culture of rebellion is that, the human persons involved forget that, once upon a time; before they became rebels; with various degrees of concentration and monopoly of lethal powers and authorities, they were part of a system with strict discipline; where everybody knows his place in the organisational structure. However, many past and current rebel organisations tend to be organised along the basis of power; and who can use this power more lethally in the human organisations collectively known as rebel movements. This kind of division of labour and allocation of authority means that, semblances of subordination are abounding, especially if the leaders are allocated powers in accordance with tribal power balance within the rebel movement. Prolonged culture of rebellions also makes many in various rebel movements to detest order and peace. Many past and current rebel leaders do not know how to handle order and controlled demeanours. The cessations of hostilities seem to herald chaos and anarchy in many rebel movements.

Various past and current rebel commanders and the top brass appear to believe that, with the advent of peace, all of them ought then to have equal or more or less same power and authority in any national government that they join. Those who could not eliminate themselves during the hay and halcyon days of their rebellion decide to see to it that; their arch-enemies must not enjoy peace in a triumphant fashion. As a result, many past and current rebel leaders decide to sort things out before everybody walk into town as former rebel leaders; but now as incarnated top brass government and national army officers. The problem with past and current rebel leaders is that, they tend to focus their attention on their personal gains to the detriment of the interests of the human persons who they hitherto purported and purport to liberate. This element of liberation seems to vanish into thin airs as soon as a political solution is found to the problem that made these guys to go to the bushes or wherever they went to fight their wars of liberation.

 National peacekeeping strategies and mechanisms surely extend to all former rebel leaders in the current government of the RoSS; as well as to current rebel leaders in the current rebel movements without exceptions. Ideally; whatever rebel leaders ought to come home and joint hands with their brothers and sisters in the war against the ills of underdevelopment, they must come with clean hands. That is, they must not come home if they eliminated some of their brothers for the sake of constitutional positions. If they did that, then those who murdered others must be tried for war crimes. Those who also frustrate the peace efforts; including those in current government of the RoSS; due to their personal greed; must be fought by all sections of South Sudanese peoples. The RoSS has had enough of bloodshed, and I do not think that the South Sudanese peoples have any more room in their kind hearts for bloodthirsty and murderous fortune seeking professional rebels. Just what is wrong with human beings? How can one human person decide to upset societal processes because he wants to hold several constitutional positions simultaneously, or something of that nature? Share out some of these positions with your comrades in arms and spare us the political troubles and instability that always ensue due to sheer human greed and selfishness.

I thought rebel leaders were selfless guys who went days on end without food in order to bear witness to the suffering of the peoples they purport to liberate. Well, their bulging tummies tell all. Another danger associated with rebel leaders is that, they tend to treat the geographical location in which they operate as their own property. For example, in South Sudan, some people within the SPLM/A treat the South Sudan like a private property of the top brass of this former rebel movement. This mentality made this top brass to forget that, South Sudan is made up of villages with respective peoples with legal rights to the land. By the same token, this mentality has made some peoples within the leadership of SPLM/A to concentrate on personal feuds while the country is slipping away into dangerous political abyss.

It is imperative that, all previous and current rebel leaders must be reminded that, if you people have lost interest in peaceful coexistence with other human race, the honest peoples of the RoSS strongly believe that, there is enough room in the country to accommodate all of us, and these peoples also strongly believe that, the best option for us in South Sudan as a multicultural, multi-religious, multiethnic, and multilingual nation is peaceful coexistence. Therefore; I call upon all previous and current rebel leaders; those in government and out of it; to emulate those political moralities which celebrate reasonable peaceful coexistence within the remit of exigencies of life in the RoSS.  I would like to tell some of the top brass of the SPLM/A that, there is no need to translate some traditional tribal feud into national crisis by frustrating all efforts exerted to realise peace in the RoSS.

All former and current rebel leaders; went into the bushes of South Sudan in order to return as rulers; and surely; they ought to have foreseen that; upon their return; they would have to interact with their country men and women who did not necessarily go into the bashes of South Sudan; but who equally fought for the same liberation of South Sudan in their various and variant means and ways.  Therefore; it was foreseeable that; the peoples of South Sudan would work together; in order to constitute a strong moral defence for their valuable peace, unity, harmony and cooperation in the RoSS. I would like to tell the top brass of previous and current rebel leaders; those in government and out of it in the RoSS; that; you do not want to be remembered in our history as the rebel leaders who destroyed the South Sudanese nation due to personal greed and selfishness. By the way, effective life as you all know almost ends around sixty five or so years of continuous living. If you look around, the league table of various age groups of the various top brasses of current and previous rebel movements, you will draw your own intimate conclusions. Power is extremely transient especially at the latter years of a human person. Why not retire with dignity and respect, and let history exonerate you from all actual and alleged misconduct if there are any at all. Let us all work hand in hand in order to build a strong moral defence for national peacekeeping strategies and mechanisms in the RoSS; in order   to safeguard the unity and sovereignty of the RoSS.

Sometimes; it appears to me that; some kind of, a reign of terror has always been inherent within the body polity of many former and current rebel movements in the RoSS. Many former and current rebel leaders and associates had and continue to live in fear for their dear lives. This observation is based on the lamentation of the late Dr Justin Yac, whence he lamented that, “…those without guns are vulnerable. The commanders are secured because they have guns to protect themselves from the Chairman, but I ask who is going to protect those without guns”. This quotation is taken from page 15 of the famous Rumbek Minutes. This is a very miserable state of affairs to put it mildly. Why should the commanders of the SPLM/A as liberators be reduced to using the guns for protecting themselves from the Chairman? If this situation was and is true, it can be logically deduced that, there were and there are many more commanders who are not afraid of the Chairman, because they are on his side.

The late Dr Yac was expressing his heartfelt concern during the living days of the late Dr Garang; the founder and absolute leader of the SPLM/A. This statement was made by the late Dr Yac in late 2004; but in fact; it sums up the very unstable inside positions of various past and current rebel movements; and the relationship between the human persons therein. It therefore follows that; there is a very likely event of a military rapture within the SPLM/A if the state of affairs as described by the late Dr Justin Yac becomes a permanent situation. Therefore, the sustenance of peace in South Sudan is logically questionable. I am genuinely worried about the fact that, if the leadership of former and current rebel movements are perceived by those closest to them as being led by a blood thirsty human persons; and who does not hesitate to kill at will, what are the chances of those who do not belong to these movements, escaping the terror that can be unleashed by the various Chairmen of such past and current movements in the RoSS? 

The question that still linger in my mind since 2004 is that; if somebody like the late Dr Justin Yac was afraid for his dear life vis-à-vis his relationship with the late Dr Garang, what about the majority of the peoples of South Sudan who were not as close to the late Dr Garnag as the late Dr Justin Yac and others in the SPLM/A? Shall those others who are deemed as outsiders vis-à-vis the SPLM/A be safe? The peoples of South Sudan would like to be reassured by the SPLM/A and other rebel movements that, they shall not use the guns under their disposal to terrorise South Sudanese who are not armed and who have no access to fire arms or machine guns. Above all, the SPLM/A as a political party must restrain their leaders who came after the late Dr Garang; from using the threat of violence as alluded to by the late Dr Justin Yac, as a means of running affairs in South Sudan. The birth of the RoSS is predicated upon peaceful coexistence of all the peoples of South Sudan. The SPLM/A as the main political party in South Sudan; and the almost sole ruler of the RoSS; ought to work hard during these tender years of the nascent RoSS; to pacify South Sudan through human reason; human rights culture; human love; equity and equality; honesty; transparency; accountability; meritocracy; and good faith governance.

The SPLM/A can rest assured that, the peoples of South Sudan are not political fools. These peoples shall not be blinded by liberation slogans and such like. The peoples of South Sudan shall not take the threat of death from any political party while lying down, and it does not matter whether that political party is the SPLM/A or whatsoever political party.  The peoples of South Sudan have voted overwhelmingly to secede in order to set up an independent and sovereign nation of their own; and it is therefore reasonable to say that; to those individuals who would like all of us to follow the SPLM/A blindly, I can strongly say that; the honest peoples of the RoSS vehemently believe in political pluralism and the rule of law. I profoundly believe that, the political future of South Sudan is a function of political tolerance and freedom of political expression within the boundaries of the law. The language of political threat influenced by tribal and cultural background is unacceptable in the new South Sudan as it were. If worse come to the worse, and if some South Sudanese want to play democratic politics through violence and the threat of violence, the honest peoples of South Sudan shall not allow that to happen in their totality.

This is a painful suggestion to make but one is compelled by the conduct of some violent South Sudanese to suggest it. The readers must know that, not all South Sudanese believe that, political and social coexistence between and among South Sudanese ought to be predicated upon violence and bloodshed. For those South Sudanese who strongly believe that killing another South Sudanese is culturally acceptable as a methodology for conflict resolution, then, to them, I would like to say that, please practice those murderous acts outside the realm of South Sudanese governance. Since South Sudanese want their governance to be informed by human rights norms and other recognisable doctrines and principles of the rule of law, therefore, raw political and tribal violence is unacceptable in South Sudan. Many refined Southern Sudanese despise naked and cultural violence; and they do not want to be surreptitiously inculcated by the culture of violence through structures of governance. The institutionalisation of violence is deplorable and all South Sudanese reject it