The Fiery Fireworks in Bor: 29 years of struggle and on…

Look and think as the picture speaks for itself

Jonglei State is where the first bullet of the current liberation struggle of SPLA was fired, and it is still the same spot where the last bullet is being fired, will probably be fired. The only disappointment here is the first bullet killed a person, and the last bullet is still killing a person in Jonglei. The state, though is held at a high historical echelon today, is still immersed in bloodbath. That explains why civilians (new civilians) almost broke their legs, if not hearts, when the fireworks were spread into the sky of Bor town from AK47s.

I thought it was a dream, because I was sleeping on a family-size bed in one of the rooms near the VIP sections of South Sudan Hotel, the leading hotel in Bor, just for now. Since a dream is, as I feel it, a mirrorring of the past or the future events, hinted or unhinted, we had discussed something related to guns a day before. “What if a tall man extends his arm (God forbid) through this low-lying window!” wondered I to Aborcup, a Murle friend that has become my follower brother. I also told him how I celebrated Antonov being shot down over Bor a another day before, according to the dream. Then this one: rat-at-tat-tat! made me jumped higher than an Agaar dancer on a huge springy sponge, to the surprise of the hovering mosquitoes.

After scrambling with me, myself and Jean Penn (me too) for the ever suspicious and unboltable window, I saw nothing! I saw the same scenario that scared me and scattered us into the dark in Omere in 1994 and Lobone in 1998, a sixteenth-May celebratory shooting by the SPLA soldiers. What a bin-Ladenic fun! But that is not the topic now. I hope I can be excused for forgetting too soon the crackling of AK-47, not withstanding the Pi/bor and Ako/bor attacks.

My concern is: should it be the routine? If so, will our kids and some other oldies, and/or even war absentees, not jump off the skyscrapper windows in the later times of our history? My insinuation in this historical insulation of the traumatic and drammatic war that we had is we should use fireworks. At least, a cheaper alternative this time, not the other ’500,000-dollar’ fireworks imported for our independence celebration. Year, it was Gen. Kuol Dim Kuol who warned in his 16th-May speech in the 1983-event commemoration held — not in but — just 5 kilometres from the spot the deadly sport took place in the 16th dawn of the world’s revolutionary month (May), 1983. “It is ‘fousa’ (meaning silliness). If our invitation team finds out that you are one of the ones who engaged in scaring our sleeping population and wasting our resources, you will see.” The general warns that the indisciple soldiers who compensate from the cut of their salaries all the bullets they had shot away, each cost 100 SSP! Hii, general, you are right, given the way my peace was broken into pieces that night! But what is the alternative next May? Or you mean no celebration?

No celebration as usual? This is the event that had poorly been celebrated or even postponed, altogether. I can hardly remember when it was celebrated on time since the ill-fated Alicopter crashed. Corrrection: Helicopter…sorry…for this literary indiscipline. I had witnessed it transferred to another freer date three times since 2005. What a f…, our old guard folks so addicted to postponement, also delayment, to the extent of adjurning history!

SPLA’s first and best Red Army in the early 80s!

On the 28th Anniversary of our liberation struggle’s birthday, there was a great disappointment, not only when the day was pushed three times, but also when the President, the history maker of this day (perhaps this month) failed to attend. There was no much reason other than mourning the forcible occupation of Abyei by Bashir’s forces. I thought our top man would find the best time to shout out all our war cry in the cradle of the still ongoing war of liberation, call it now ‘self-defence’. Imagine your dad forcifully postponing your birthday! Unless he was born on a day other than yours.

The same complaint was painfully recounted to The Star newspaper in 2009, which I happened to edit. The Letters section contributor echoed the reasons that led to the abuse of this date, too disheartening to repeat here. Of course, there are so many lieutenants in the current government that did not share in that day, including those who even tried to make it not happen. Please, do your own research; lest I am come for!

The Manual Chart for Malual-chaat: Could this be a site for the heroes’ monuments? If I were a date setter, I would say: Independence Day to be celebrated in Juba every July 9 and may May 16 be commemorated in Bor annually. But with more decent fireworks next time, better than the sparks you will find in the following poems, please!

Salva Kiir Mayardit and the Jesh Ahmr in the bush

 

***

POEMS for May 16th from Chapter I: ‘Heroism and Nationalism’, from the book The Black Christs of Africa, by this author.

***

Poem 1

 *

The Black Christs of Africa

*

You, O saviours, I salute,

With due honours absolute

To you, whether here on earth,

Or who weather there in the hearth.

No vain salvation with blood.

We the heirs of your vein flood

Believe our crises have been atoned

By you our Christs that have been stoned.

Being black is not being blank.

Our Herods crucified our heroes,

But their Bloc can’t block the Black.

Hail Jesuses, to heaven your souls sail,

But Hell Judases, to oven your souls sell;

As we, here in Africa, err,

Remain heir in a free care,

Our Martyrs, it’s you we owe,

Our murder land, it’s we you awe,

Our Motherland, it’s you we own.

*

Relevant Quote

I don’t mind if my life goes in the service of the nation. If I die today every drop of my blood will invigorate the nation.

Indira Gandhi (1917 - 1984)

Indian Prime Minister.

Said the night before she was assassination.

*

Poem 2

 *

The Blood Donors of Africa*

*

The donors of blood

Are redeemers of life

Of patients who cry flood

In bitter search for sweet life…

Till they breathe last—get floored

On their earth deathbeds, they strive.

He who drains a vein

To irrigate your dry life

Is no daring saviour in vain.

Our land is a hospital of strife,

Where bloody bannered war van

Is burned with a million donors of life.

Blood’s the cocoon of life

And  they that offer blood,

Donate with it their own life.

The rivers and floods of blood,

With multitudes of Christly life,

Have redeemed our beloved Bilad

El-Sudan.

*

Relevant Quote

The struggle for black freedom has been tied to their history by cords of anguish and rivers of blood.

Vincent Harding (1931 - )

U.S. historian.

The Other American Revolution

*

Poem 4

*

St. John Garang

*

His name is John,

Who baptized us with blood,

Fire and spirit of nationalism

In Red Sea, Nile and Mount Senile.

A practical Pastor,

Who preached the message of unity

And peace on the podium of rigidity

In the stadium of dignity.

A dogmatic Doctor,

Who prescribed medicines of freedom

Against injustice and serfdom

With our own toil on our own soil.

A firm farmer,

Who sowed seeds of prosperity,

And self-determination for posterity,

With a nuclear tractor.

A gallant General,

Who led a resistance against the wall of Jericho,

And felled it down,

With a hundredfold armies by a thousandfold enemies.

The Black Christ of Africa: he is

Prophet Moses II,

Martin Luther King II;

He is John the Baptist II,

Beheaded for being big-headed

Against illegitimate inheritance of our Mother.

St. John II is whole alive,

For heroes ne’er mortally die,

They – into political hibernation – dive,

And – in historical metamorphosis – lie

In an actively fossilized volcanic ambush,

To erupt into another hero in arms and bush.

Saint John Garang,

A political martyr and missionary,

The Sent, John Garang,

A historical revolutionary and visionary.

Sudan will never be the same again,

Said John Garang.

Amen!-?

*

Relevant Quote

That new saint, than whom nothing purer or more brave was ever led by love of men into conflict and death…will make the gallows glorious like the cross.

Attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 - 1882)

U.S. poet and essayist.

Referring to John Brown’s execution.

*

Poem 4

*

Nailson Mandela

*

Abandoned, the Blacks became abundant and

Redundant. He saw them resorting to their socio-economic

Idol worshipping as they were damn

Idle. Yet their miserable life that had

Cordoned them off into their health-gagged ghettos (was)

Condoned by their overwhelmingly wealth-gagged geckos.

Reasons, as such, made him braved

Prisons, where he met his comrades

Rot for the very cause. Of course, he’d

Not surrendered to the racial abuse (of)

Apartheid, whose architects’ political

Appetite was the Blacks’ gaping abyss.

Nelson Mandela was the native African

Nail sown under the oppressive, suppressive, exotic cushion.

Because he was annoyed with the unholy spread of Afrikaan racism,

Of course he was anointed with the oily spirit of African nationalism,

Rust or rot never destroyed his vision and mission in captivity as he did

Trust not the harmnesty from the faces of the fascists and the racists.

Downloaded his roles from our African Dinosaurs

–Nailson Man-dela –

Uploaded these roles to our African die-innocents:

Hail Samora Michel.

Hail Garang de Mabior, and all the

Black martyrs of Africa, (the)

Black Christs of Africa.

*

 Relevant Quote

“I will never ask for amnesty. Not now, not tomorrow, not after tomorrow.”

PW Botha, June 1999, Truth and Reconciliation Commission (of South Africa).

 

 *

Poem 5

*

Martin Luther King II

The first and best Katipa Banat (Girls Battalion) in Bilpam in early 80s.

*

Martin Luther is King.

He’s not a losers’ king.

The seeds of freedom he has sown,

The seat of reformation he has shown,

Like the white Martin, Luther I,

Who filtered Protestantism from Catholicism,

The Black Martin Luther II,

Fostered protectionism against Racism.

It was from his footstep

In 1955 that Rosa Park,

Of Southern USA, Rose not to pack

For a white passenger.

Turning into a wild messenger,

She defied the white man

And defined the black man

In the history of mankind in America

With the story of man coming from Africa.

It was from her footstep

That women put their fullstop

To mark their marginalization,

To make their realization

In the world all of a sudden.

Like Katipa Banat of Southern Sudan,

Since 1955, the women battalions,

Warrior wives of battle lions,

Who played their roles in the fights,

Paid and paved the way for their rights.

It is better to be the widow of a hero than the wife of a coward.

Dolores Ibárruri (1895 – 1989)

Spanish politician and journalist.

*

Poem 8

*

The Gangs of Hollow Wood

*

Gang-gang-aha-a-a…!

Snigger they,

The sneaky niggers,

At them sleazy cowards,

Who dive in holes with moles and rats.

Rat-a-tat-‘tat…!

Fire they,

The hot gang,

At them too timid,

Who lie in burrows with rabbits.

Rap, rap-up, rip off, hip hop…!

Rap they,

The holly gang

Of our hollow wood,

Who dies for us for our paradise.

Hail our commando,

Led by John Commander,

The best actor and director,

Of the holly gang of hollow wood,

For the saddened peoples’ libation armistice,

Or the saddened peoples’ libation moment.

*

Relevant Quote                                                                                                 

I don’t know what effect these men will have on the enemy, but, by God, they frighten me.

Attributed to Duke of Wellington (1769 - 1852)

Irish-born British general and prime minister, 1810.

*

Poem 9

*

In The Battle of Holy Wood

*

The Elephant Grass,

Mowed down by foe’s sickle,

Withered but did not waver;

They fell – were felled – for us,

In The Battle of Holy Wood.

The Giant Ebony trees,

Hewed down by foe’s axe,

Did it and became the weaver

Of a Freedom Palace for us,

In The Battle of Holy Wood.

The Gallant Scapegoats and Rams,

Sacrificed on the Altar of Justice,

So that today, after today and forever

We survive budding in their chorus,

To further on The Battle of Holy Wood.

The virtuously insane Saints,

Crucified at the Calvary of Slavery,

So that today, after today and forever

We build our Secret Sacred Shrine,

With their pallid, solid, hollow wood,

Fetched from The Battlefield of Holy Wood.

*

Relevant Quote

For all have not the gift of martyrdom.

John Dryden (British Poet, Dramatist and Critic of Literacy, 1631 – 1700)

*

Poem 10

*

In the Noon Moon

*

When our men got annoyed

By the spirit of racism,

They also got anointed

With the spirit of nationalism,

With which they got drugged

To the extent of betting by their land,

Allowing their valour to have them dragged

Like termites into the swimming parlour of fire.

We owe Bul Koch and the rests who risked for our land,

For which they braved the grave and swore by bonfire,

That they licked as it licked them in the noon moon.

Long live the Anya-nya gallant warriors,

That got drunk

Against the spirit of serfdom.

They stood up to dunk

Their might in the spirit of freedom.

Addicted to national alcoholism,

They challenged rains of fire,

In search of liberty in colonialism.

They spent the simmering summers of the noon,

Enjoying the African heavenly fire

with the romantic feeling of a noon moon.

*

Relevant Quote

Once plagued with a tragic sense of inferiority resulting from the effects of slavery and segregation, the Negro has now been driven to reevaluate himself. He has come to feel that he is a somebody. With this new sense of somebodiness and self-respect, a new Negro has emerged with a new determination to achieve freedom and human dignity whatever the cost maybe.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

The Testament of Hope.

*

Poem 11

*

The Moods in the Woods

 ***

When we deserted our town,

And laid our serfdom tool down,

And rushed for our freedom tickets,

In our own native impenetrable thickets,

The machines jangled in the jungle of Jonglei,

With the epic poems of the jungle by jongleur,

Ringing thr’out the vastness of the Africountry.

The war cry and  freedom bell of the century,

Rung by the biblical tall and smooth-skinned

Folks, feared far an’ wide as wrath-skilled.

The men that then transpired fire

And perspired  scarlet water

on faces making kids falter,

had the moods of doom,

in the woods of boom.

Lo, as if out of tombs

With their bombs,

They dared death

And saved  birth.

They saw blood

like the flood

that swept

all bereft

of their lives

and their hives.

*

Relevant Quote

The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his.

General George Patton (1885 – 1945)

*

Poem 12

*

Goons of Boons

*

Yes, go ahead; push me,

Load onto my head even three,

Only when doing it for my good.

Even if I’m working with no food,

As I’m trudging on bare foot,

Yes, kick me with your boot.

Unlike them I won’t call you goons,

For them you are my fellow baboons.

Though I’m damn sweating,

I know my future is awaiting,

Only that you later destroy it not by spoons,

Thence will I call you my goons of my boons.

*

Relevant Quote

“Alah! arah, move! Boy, you are too young to ask why and know where you are carrying this. Soon you will,” said a Sudan Peoples’ Liberation Army’s freedom fighter of the Lion Battalion to this poet as he was being herded and loaded with boxes of explosives from his village in 1986. Four years later, he was able to know and join them in the bush.

FINALLY, somebody made justice to our history here, please click this link and watch the best part of our nationalism in action. I am proud that I am involved in one of the songs linked!

http://paanluelwel2011.wordpress.com/2012/05/15/yom-sit-tashar-mayo/

 

The Loopholes: Or the Loops and the Holes in the Jonglei CPA

Jonglei peace finally hatched out of the cocoon of conflict

Several agreements have been initially agreed or decreed, but eventually violated. By who? No, that is not the interest of this writer. The first question is How? and the best question is not ‘By Who’ but ‘But Why’?

On the fifth day of the fifth month in the Year of Our Lord, AD 2012, I witnessed another comprehensive peace agreement in Bor, the capital ‘village’ of Jonglei State, dissimilar to the one I witnessed on January 9, 2005, in Nairobi, the capital city of Kenya. It is not my duty to explain why the two agreements are not the similar or how dissimilar they are. However, I will herein briefly explain why I think there are loopholes, say, the loops and the holes in our Jonglei CPA. Who dug them? Name them…!

 

From CPA to cpa

But before we name the loops and their holes according to the Jonglei accord, let us first know that every agreement in South/Sudan is penultimately a comprehensive peace agreement but ultimately a compressive peace argument. I mean the document that appears to be an agreement in the beginning turns out to be a piece of argument by the end. This is true of the Sudanese comprehensive agreement (CPA), as evidenced still today in Abyei and Panthou (let them call it Heglig/Hijlij). Unless we are careful, I mean extra careful, the Jonglei Communities Peace Accord (CPA) may follow suit. Why? How?

1- Attacks during peace talks

On the first of May, the day the talks kicked off at Dr. John Garang Hall in South Sudan Hotel, Bor, the Murle Community brought the opening ceremony to a standstill. They, in a kinda boycott, stood still from morning to afternoon, defying humble begging by Gov. Kuol Manyang and Gen. Kuol Dim, to join the rest of the communities and open the talks. Reasons: Their three traders were killed on the way from Bor to Pibor by some raiders. As soon as they entered the hall at around 3PM, Gen. Kuol Dim popped in with news of the Murle having attacked in a number of places named. The following morning, news came in that the alleged Murle attacked Ethiopia and killed 8, resulting in Meles Zenawi, Ethiopian Primier, indefinitely closing the border right from Raad to Maiwut, or as far as it stretches between Ethiopia and South Sudan. This was bad news to the Anyuak, whose king’s emissary had just complained that their community was anticipating the worst i.e. closure of border, as a result of the aggressive 4,000 Murle youths sighted along the border.  It happened! It also happened in Twic East County in another fulfilment of a women representative who complained that the Murle had closed the roads between Bor and Panyagoor, making route diverted to the Toic (Nile). “If you want to go toTwic Payam of Maar, you will have to go and take a boat to Bor town, then back through Bor County to Twic County. Even as I am talking now, they may strike along the Toic,” she prophesied, and it happened that they attacked Dong village cattle camp on their way back from the Nile valley.

In addition, the timing of the peace process coincided with the disarmament exercise, both for peacemaking purposes in Jonglei State. However, the disarmament overspilled into peace conference hall. That is why Gen. Kuol Dim and his guys would stage news announcement before and after every session. “Out of the 52 attacks by Murle on Bor, Lou and also on the SPLA forces, only one was an attack on Murle, the recent one of the traders of yesterday,” the general revealed.

1- The Composition of the Presidential Committee on Peace, Reconciliation and Tolerance in Jonglei State.

As if to tell the Jongleyans that you have all failed and, hence, are punished by having zero membership on the supreme committee that was appointed by the president of the Republic to bring final and long-last peace to the state tartered and scattered by numerous battles of cattle, a mistake was made. As is always the case with our African traditional lifestyle, there is no way a visitor should come to your house in the name of solving your problem, calling you unfit, hence, cooking your meal and serving it to you and your children, hands folded. This was mistake number one. How? The drivers of all the 8 peace caravan vans (cars), all come from Eastern Equatoria or so. The errand boys all come from Equatoria or so. The secretaries all come from Kenya, Uganda or Equatoria, but under an underlying organization called Sudan Council of Churches. I mean the official ones. And by ’official ones’ I mean those who deserve payment by the end of the day. And indeed, they did, leaving our boys or other busybody gang with bones to ‘ngang ngang’ on.

2- Financial Disappointments

While the 75 peace caravan youth under Jonglei Civil Society Group were not a central part of the budget, they were an integral part of the peace tour throughout the state. The Presidential Committee asked them not only to present their peace approach but also to move with them in the villages. Indeed, they did so. However, by the end of the day, they ended up looking up to the manna that may fall after the Archbishop’s chairmanship. One of the youth made a comment that the collar guys were more unfriendly than the tie guys among the team members. Why? Only the God knows.

What this writer knows is not beyond his own woes, given his position on the civil society team. The SCC group, who stubbornly refers to us as organized youth and not Jonglei Civil Society Group, left a time bomb in our peace camp. After Sunday, May 6, I found myself in a mess to meddle in the puzzle of sharing out 11,000 (about 2,000 USD) among 75 card-holders of JCSG, an amount apparently half of each team secretary’s worth. The worst part of this deal is that all the money was pinned on the bills of accommodation and other services given to our boys, especially those who do not come from Greater Bor or Greater Akobo.

Another bone of contention and discontent was the artists (under Jonglei Art and Music Association), part of the civil society, whose final reward for entertaining, informing and pacifying the conferees was 2,000 SSP (don’t know the current value in US dollars). This amount given to 10 artists of differing messages and different ethnic origins was an insult to the unity of the conference participants. In fact, the amount given to all the 10 artists was really 2,000 SSP compared to the 10,000 SSP given to 2 artists who came from Juba. This meagre pay was half the pay of one driver who made a trip to Pibor or Ayod! Well, the problem was not the little money, the issue was little faith the peacemakers had, which resulted into them leaving the peace supportive camps on fire. This fulfills Chief Galuak Thow’s advice to Jonglei communities during the sessions:

2- The Peace Processes

The peace processes right from the village tours to the regional (or greater sections) conferences and the state conference were so hurriedly conducted in such a way that they could not sink deeper into the minds and hearts of the communities. Also, they were simultaneously conducted with the disarmament, hence the disarmament problems overspilled into the conference hall. For instance, in the beginning and the end of, say, every session, Lt. Gen. Kuol Dim Kuol, commander for Operations Restore Peace in Jonglei, would pop up every now and then to announce, “Murle criminals have attacked here, they also did it there, and were repulsed or are bieing pursued by our forces.” During the first day of the opening, the session was delayed upto the afternoon because the Murle community were boycotting the meeting. They heard in the morning that their traders were killed in a vehicle on the way to Pibor. This was neutralized by the similar news of Murle having attacked a vehicle in which two Ethiopian businessmen were killed on the way from Pibor. As if that was not enough, news trickled in that Ethiopia had indefinitely closed their border due to deadly attacked by Murle youth inside Ethiopian territory, making the cattle war of Jonglei an international conflict.

3- Lack of understanding among the peace actors.

The Signitaries planked by the Dignitaries during the final signing of the peace accord in Bor, Jonglei State on May 5, 2012.

As alluded to early in point No.1, the peace actors in Jonglei State seem to have been not on one unanimous slogan. Anyway, there was unanimity by some quarters almost turned it into enmity. For example, according to bystanders, there seemed to have been bad blood running between the Jonglei Civil Society Group and the Sudan Council of Churches, the former being the legally recognized umbrella for the civil society CBOs and associations in Jonglei as the latter is a dangling outfit of the Presidential committee in the sense that SCC is related to the Chairperson of the Committee, the Archbishop of Episcopal Church of South Sudan and Sudan. The two were doing one thing but not thinking one thing, and this features greatly in their  approaches as shown on the blocked presentation of the civil society, to which this writer is affiliated.

Also, according to many voices in the Presidential Committee and the State quarters, including their spectators, the Chairman, and in this case the Archbishop, almost sounded like the ‘harsh bishop’ in his handling of the dangling structures attempting to partake in the process. This is also seen in the way the greatest but most inclusive group, the Jonglei Civil Society youth peace caravan camps, were treated in the field as well as in the peace centre in Bor. As a result of this outlook by the members (especially the collar-wearing ones/thanks to the coat-wearing ones) of the Presidential Committee on Community Peace, Reconciliation and Tolerance, there was little tolerance among the peace actors. This,  therefore, is insinuated in the presentations of the JCSG (Jonglei Civil Society Group)’s, which inlcude the following.

NB: The following document should not be misunderstood for any rival paper. It is actually part and parcel of the implementation modality as adapted a day later, after the neglect by the Chairman. It was designed by the JCSG team to address the part three, which was deemed the most essential part of the conference, The IMPLEMENTATION modalities. Unfortunately, this third stage was not discussed by the delegates from all the counties of the state but by the presidential committee the night following the conference. Hence, the confusion by many delegates, not far from even the state authorities, who later asked when or how the implementation methodologies were designed. This attachment should not be taken as an answer to the said methodology but was an integral part, which is said to have been adopted in silence and in reference unilaterally by the committee later.

Presentation by Jonglei Civil Society Group

In the Jonglei Communities Peace Conference

South Sudan Hotel, Bor.

May 4, 2012

Background

This presentation is a brief summary of the Phase I of the project called “Jonglei Peace Caravan Camp” carried out by Jonglei Civil Society Group; a consortium of community youth associations, CBOs, artists group, women groups and other stakeholders in the search for lasting peace in Jonglei State. The Phase I peace camping caravan was implemented by 75 youth volunteers from 45 local organizations subdivided into 5 camps namely: Greater Pibor Peace Caravan Camp (PPCC-1), Greater Akobo Peace Caravan (APCC-1), Greater Bor Peace Caravan (BPCC-1), Greater Fangak Peace Caravan (FPCC-1) and Mobile Peace Caravan Camp (MPCC-0) within a period of 75 days of field work. The youths were drawn by community appointment from five tribes of Jonglei State (with exception of Kachipo).

The following issues were examined and outlined from the whole report, whose parts have been exhausted by the community presentations during the conference. Therefore, the points mentioned herein might be a repetition but are tackled in a different way the Civil Society members wanted. In other words, they are the POTENTIAL THREATS TO THE COMPREHENSIVE PEACE IN JONGLEI unless (a) resolved comprehensively and (b) implemented strictly by all the relevant peace actors in the state.

a)- Potential Problems to the current Jonglei Peace Process

1- Reasons making disarmament not being comprehensive throughout the state

2- intra-community issues not yet solved within the tribes and among the counties themselves

3- The complex fate of the abductees (tracing, identification and reunification)

4- Poverty and economic disparity making local population vulnerable to manipulation

5- Youth Unemployment giving youth an excuse for raids, robberies and bad politics

6- Different interest groups among the peace actors in Jonglei

7- Political interference and external aggression

b)- Solutions

The JCSG members propose that the current Presidential Committee on Peace, Reconciliation and Tolerance be transformed into a more permanent and more inclusive body i.e. Jonglei Peace and Development Authority (JPDA) comprising e.g. representatives from national government, state government, traditional authorities (chiefs), development partners (NGOs), and Civil Society to oversee the implementation committees and projects right after this Jonglei Communities Peace Conference.

1- A committee for youth and chiefs to be formed to accompany the SPLA disarmament forces in the villages and the SPLA to be legally empowered to use force wherever necessary.

2- Formation of a new committee to follow up and organize intra-communal dialogues, divided into three phases: youth dialogue, Chiefs dialogue, politician dialogue.

3- Formation of committee of chiefs and legal experts to follow up the abductees’ cases.

4- Formation of resource mobilization and sharing committee

5- Youth mobilization and engagement committee (under youth associations and civil society)

6- Jonglei Peace Actors Coordination Committee to solve problems of interests, differences, approaches, etc. among various peace actors.

7- Government and communities to establish joint intelligence systems to monitor activities of external aggressors and unscrupulous politicians.

c)- Action Points for JCSG

1- Continuation and sustainability of youth mobilization throughout Jonglei State to solve youth problems of idleness and violence.

2- Participation of Jonglei Civil Society members in the various peace implementation committees.

3- Training and capacity building of youth under JCSG

4- Participation in community development activities

d) Timeframe for the implementation of Jonglei Communities Peace Conference resolutions (counting down of the following deadlines begins from the closing date of the peace conference).

1- Formation of implementation committees: 2 weeks

2- Mobilization of resources: 4 weeks

3- Implementation of peace through development projects: 8 weeks after the formation of the committees

***

MAIN DOCUMENT FOR JONGLEI PEACE CONFERENCE

To read a complete document signed by all the chiefs of Jonglei State on May 5, 2012, please click the following links from the same blog: http://weakleak.wordpress.com/docleaks/ (Scroll the page towards the bottom to see the full document.)

 

Governor, VP exemplify Forgiveness in Easter Message

Archbishop and bishops pray for Peter Kuol Chol Awan and his comrades. Kuol Chol is the successor to the late Gen. George Athor Deng, in Bor on April 3, 2012

“This thing is not in our culture. It is a habit of Western people to openly confess their mistakes… (quotes not verbatim) But if this is what people want, then, my brother Riek, let us do it. So if there is anybody here or from Nuer that I have wronged in the past, I ask for forgiveness,” said Jonglei Governor, Kuol Manyang  Juuk, in a highly attended workshop in Dr. John Garang Hall, South Sudan Hotel, Bor, on April 3, 2012. The planning workshop marked the launching of the peace project in Jonglei State by the Presidential Committee on Peace, Reconciliation and Tolerance, chaired by His Grace Dr. Daniel Deng Bul, Archbishop of the Episcopal Church of the Sudan.

This was in reaction to Dr. Riek Machar’s repeated apology and request for forgiveness to the people of Bor in particular due to the 1991 massacres and of South Sudan in general, for all the atrocities associated with him and his forces during and after the split of the SPLA during the war of liberation. Dr. Riek repeated what Gov. Kuol first deemed to have been ‘said too many times’, every time the VP speaks to audience of Bor origin. In spite of Kuol seemingly reservation on that culture of apology and reconciliation, he later gave in under the heavy load of peace and reconciliation that was hanging over every attendant in the hall. Peace seemed to have descended from Heaven as every participant’s body language was shouting, “Let’s speak out, let’s confess our sins.”

In the course of the VP’s speech, new development cropped up as Peter Kuol Chol Awan stepped up and joined the VP in a chorus of confession followed by intercession from the bishops for forgiveness, a spiritual and mutual pardon from above and from below, respectively. “I ask the people of Jonglei State, especially Greater Fangak, to forgive us and embrace peace. We are here for peace.” Kuol Chol Awan is the man who was appointed to replace the late George Athor Deng, who was killed late last year. “I was just somebody of the lower rank in the hierarchy when people called me and made me the successor of George Athor. So instead of continue fighting the war, I asked them to lay down their arms and join our brothers in Juba for peace. That was wisdom from God.” Kuol Awan confessed and then hugged Hon. Gier Chuang Aluong, MP from Pigi County, who was alleged to have bad brotherly blood with Athor.

Peter Kuol Chol Awan, the leader of George Athor's rebels raises up his hands in a sign of surrender to peace as Dr. Riek and Gov. Kuol Manyang embrace each other in front of the Archbishop and a hall full of peacemakers in Bor on April 3, 2012 (Photo by J. Penn de Ngong, Sec. Gen. of Jonglei Civil Society Group).

Generally, the mood of reconciliation was adjusted opportunistically by one Martha, a Nuer Musician in her prime, who mixed messages of peace, forgiveness and reconciliation in a chorus of the names of Nuer,Murle and Dinka. It was irresistible. I felt like shouting out some anonymous names that I might have wronged. But I found nobody in my grudge notebook whom to confess and apologize to. I only found in my bitter memories the Arabs, but then I was too late. I should have done that long ago in Naivasha and Nairobi when we penned the war from the war of weapons to war of words. Nevertheless, I still have to apologize on behalf of my community. That is if unknowingly my relative or tribesman has stepped on the toe of the other tribesman. Similarly, I take this opportunity to ask for forgiveness from whoever that has hurt me in terms of my heart, my hut, my cow, my mother, brother, sister and my father who was killed in the 1991… I ask for a word of condolence from your uncle, please, just as my uncle has done it on our behalf, please. Thanks to the wise Vice President and the gallant governor, a former SPLA senior commander, whose patriotic addiction to the liberation war made him seen as an enemy in the eyes of the local people, especially the Bor folks, who were the nucleus of the mobilization by then and are the epicentre of the demobilization by now.

However, I am very crossed with the distant internet critics who jumped into analysis yet they were not part of the attendance in that hall of apology and reconciliation in Bor. I do not like critics but I do want their critiques. But not the type of critique I read on Mr. X’s piece of mind. Not the criticism I heard from Mr. Y’s foul mouth the other day. I like politics but I hate politicking, especially this guy and his dirty heat. Why should somebody think if peace is allowed in Jonglei State in particular and in Greater Upper Nile in general, somebody will not win elections somewhere or inherit a seat thereof? How come such thoughts are allowed to invade our politics too soon like now, especially even before the blood of our martyrs is dried up under the trees and in the trenches of the war of liberation! If such a person is here to turn our coexistence as one people into his/her existence as one person, may the Almighty God ignore Jesus’s Easter appeal to “forgive them for they do not know what they are doing”, but take such a person(s) to Somalia, where they would be compatible with sectional and sectarian politics out there.

Politics of 2015 aside, don’t you think it is prudent at this time for our once blind leaders, who later saw the light, to now come up and get saved before they get served by their people they once misled and bled? Don’t you think it is high time we called ourselves a people of a nation? This is Easter. And this piece is my sermon. It was stimulated by my colleague, Akol Wek, who woke me up on Easter Sunday with this SMS.

We know, as the governor mentioned, it is hard to confess and forgive, but which is harder: to forgive and forget the wrongs committed last time or the wrongs being committed this time? I mean, if Jesus Christ could forgive those who are in action of hitting the nails into his palm on the cross now, then why is it impossible to do so to those who crucified our relatives sometimes back?

Gov. Kuol Manyang (current governor), Sultan Ismail Konyi, Michael Mario (both former governors of Jonglei State) and others raise up their joint hands in a show for peace, reconciliation and forgiveness in front of the Presidential Committee on Peace, Reconciliation and Tolerance in South Sudan Hotel, Bor, on April 3, 2012

Jesus has resurrected. It is a sign of victory. I think the SPLA has something in common with this Easter, especially in the northerly direction. And if we could win in the war of guns, why not also in the war of love? Since we are able as a nation to defend our territory to the extent of bringing down a pilotless metallic wizard, an ‘Iran-made iron messenger’, the semblance of American drone sent to spy on behalf of the Sudan Intelligence. The most advance jet fighter, MIG29, was brought down by the SPLA, besides some bodies lying here and there are a sign of an Easter victory. A victory against the enemies of God’s people, the enemies who had been crucified on the wrong cross like the thieves besides Jesus.

Well, to conclude, more than this victory is needed amongst ourselves as individuals and communities of South Sudan.  We need peace, forgiveness and tolerance. We need development. In short, we need to shoot down the drones and MIG29s, which are inside our hearts as individuals and communities of South Sudan. Who and how will this be done? We in the Jonglei Civil Society Group here are doing it in our villages. How about you over?

 

Summarized Report on the Disarmament in Jonglei State by Jonglei Civil Society Group

 

A Two-week Summarized Report on the Disarmament Operations by Jonglei Civil Society Group

JCSG Centre

Bor

March 25, 2012

"You know that black men cannot rule themselves; give them guns and they will kill each other,"-- P.W. Botha, King of Apartheid, the same message repeated by the Sudan's King of Apartheid, Omar al Bashir, now being fulfilled by the South Sudanese.

For Press Release

In the third week of our field work as Jonglei Civil Society Group in the state as a consortium of indigenous NGOs, CBOs, FBOs, youths and artists associations from Lou-Nuer, Murle and Bor-Dinka communities in particular, and other ethnic groups of Jonglei State in general, we kicked off our mission with the monitoring of the disarmament exercise conducted in the towns and villages of Jonglei State from the 14^th to the 24^th of March, 2012.

During our involvement as sensitizing and monitoring team in between the communities and the disarmament forces (mainly the SPLA and South Sudan Police Services), Our Mobile Team collected the following information from the communities and authorities, who are involved in the Operation Restore Peace (ORP) in Jonglei State:

H.E. Kuol manyang Juuk inspects the arms cache at Malual-chaat garrison the first day of disarmament in Jonglei State, March 14, 2012. (Photo by John Penn).

a)- GREATER BOR: As opposed to the general anticipation that the disarmament operations would instantly turn bloody, it was not the case during the first two days. In Bor, where the disarmament kicked off first, our observers did not see any force-to-force confrontation. However, a few pockets of scuffles between the armed soldiers and some civilians were reported, but on a person-to-person duel as a result of resistance by some individuals attempting to hinder soldiers from entering and searching their houses, shops or offices. Other civilians clashed with drunk soldiers on duty. Asked why some citizens were beaten up or harassed during the process, one local leader, who requested anonymity, said, “People refuse to give soldiers access to their property because they do not trust them.” He blamed the past experiences whereby some people lost their belongings in such searches.

Nevertheless, in the first week of our involvement, the JCSG mobile team recorded major incidences in Bor County’s Kolnyang Payam, Pariak Boma. The soldiers who combed through the villages at night raped one breastfeeding mother. The two culprits were apprehended and are facing court procedures in Bor, the capital of the state. Our team could not get access to talk to the accused soldiers who are in military prison in Malual Chaat, Bor, but their commanders confirmed the arrests and the legal litigations being pursued. Besides, there were sporadic reports of beatings and intimidation by some soldiers in the villages. The Jonglei Civil Society Group (JCSG) team condemned these horrendous acts of torturing or intimidating children and women to expose guns from their men. These complaints were presented by the team to the ORP commander, who promised to correct the situation. So far, the team has seen notable changes in the behavior of the soldiers since the JCSG’s presentations and the subsequent arrests of the culprits in the Bor area. The operations going on in Twic East and Duk Counties of the Greater Bor territory have not recorded major incidences, so far, besides minor complaints from victims of soldiers’ wrong method of gun collection.

Unfortunately, the natives of Bor are torn in between handing their guns over to the armed forces or keeping them to defend themselves from frequent attacks by Murle youth even during the disarmament process. “We are confused,” said one chief from Gok area of Bor County, “we are being attacked by two different forces; one collecting guns from our hands and the other collecting our cattle and killing our children and women from our villages and cattle camps. We do not know who is working for or against who between the SPLA and the Murle.” The old man said when they tell the disarmament forces to attack the cattle raiders, the soldiers said, “We have never been given orders from above.” He gave example of the recent Baidit raids that left two children dead and many heads of cattle taken at Mathiang Boma, the village where the state governor, Kuol Manyang Juuk, hails from. This is the same in the Lou areas of Akobo.

b)- GREATER PIBOR: When our three-member team arrived at Pibor aboard an SPLA helicopter carrying the Governor of Jonglei State, the Minister for Defence (RSS), the SPLA Chief of General Staff, the Commander for Operations Restore Peace – Jonglei, among other government officials and army officers, these observations were made in the first visit, March 15. First, the disarmament process was peaceful in such a way that no organized groups confronted the disarmament troops who were searching the town of Pibor, but news of mounting resistance in the villages were being whispered in Pibor town as the team interacted with some new arrivals from the outskirts of the town. Two days later, the tension calmed down.

A victim of disarmament lies unconscious at Pibor health centre on March 15, 2012. The JCSG team was told that he succumbed to the injuries a day later.

In terms of soldiers’ unwarranted procedures, the team witnessed one Sebit, a welder, in the presence of Nyany Korok, Pibor youth leader, being beaten up a few metres from the commissioner’s office, where the top leaders were conducting their briefing. The reason for the incident was not clear but eyewitnesses around told the JCSG team that the man had attempted to resist soldiers’ access to his garage, a report not confirmed from the victim and the soldiers as the two parties were not in position of communicating to the third party. Other incidences of beatings were confirmed on two victims whom the team saw on the MSF health centre wards in Pibor town. The MSF hospital authority advised the team not to interact with the patients or publish their pictures for various reasons, including the fear for the patients being psychologically disturbed by appearance of ‘strange visitors’ in the wards afterwards. One of the two victims was reported to have passed away due to injuries on his head a day later. Several other reports of the youth attacking the disarmament soldiers and vice versa were still trickling in by the time this report was compiled.

The most recent incident being in Boma town, whereby the Maruwo Payam head chief, Baba Mojong, was seriously injured allegedly by the area commander’s body guard as a result of a quarrel as they were drinking together with the chief. The chief was brought to Juba for treatment of bullet wounds according to our contacts in the area. This was not an attack by the youth of the area as initially reported by the ‘phone call media’ reporters. Our coordination team in Juba is monitoring his condition.

Chief Gulech Wawu of Manyabol boma, Gumuruk payam, hands over his AK47 to Col. Gai Chatim, Chief Intelligence, ORP, in front of the Vice President, Governor, Minister for Defence, etc.

In the second visit under the leadership of the Vice President, Dr. Riek Machar and many other top leaders of the South Sudan Government and army to Greater Pibor Area, namely: Manyabol boma (Gumuruk Payam), Boma Payam and Pibor town on March 20, our team members comprising natives of Murle, Jie, Jieng and Lou interacted with many youths and traditional leaders.

In Manyabol, the huge delegation of the Vice President, the governor, Minister for Defence, Deputy Minister for Interior, the area MPs and the civil society members from JCSG among others were received by huge crowd dancing and ululating. The chiefs and youth leaders pledged to hand over their guns, given an assurance that the government put forth guarantees to protect them. To demonstrate goodwill and their promise, Chief Gulech Wawu handed over his gun to the Vice President after completing his speech.

The team proceeded to Pibor, then to Boma Payam (Jie and Kachipo areas) and then back to Pibor. While in Boma, the government delegations and the civil society members met three ethnic groups of Murle, Jie and Kachipo inhabiting the area, which converged in Boma town. The VP and the team wanted to know the level of peace and coexistence among the three communities in the area and their readiness to surrender their guns to the government. The meeting ended successfully with both sides stressing their assurances if certain conditions are met, especially the exchange of guns for security that the communities demand from the government during the disarmament exercise throughout the state. The Vice President returned to Pibor and remained in the Murle areas for two more days of sensitize.

The second day, the team visited Nanam areas of northern Murle, namely Bichibich, Raprap (Gumuruk) and Karyak of Likuangole Payam. The meeting at Bichibich Swampland revealed the initial lack of cooperation between the soldiers and the civilians in the area. Due to lack of sufficient and efficient awareness on disarmament, the locals were reported to have vacated the village upon sighting the SPLA forces coming into their area. They laid an ambush in anticipation of any action by the soldiers, but the tension was defused by the disarmament forces who broke into the cordone without shooting. They collected 234 guns according to the area commander.

In Karyak boma, the incident of shooting had taken place on the first day of the entry of the SPLA forces. The youth opened fire on the soldiers’ APC (armoured personnel carrier) vehicle, killing one soldier and wounding the driver, also a soldier. The SPLA did not retaliate by fire but swiftly deployed around the village, putting the villagers under arrest so that they would not interact with other villages or call for more reinforcement from their youth in the bush. In a separate incidence, one soldier was killed by unidentified group after he was overtaken by their pickup APC car. It is also claimed he was killed along with one 12-year old boy. The SPLA managed to seize 54 AK47 rifles, and 34 different makes of rifles, which were voluntarily handed in by the chief after the siege of his boma. The Vice President went and defused the tension and the two parties are now coexisting and cooperating in the operation. The tensest area of operation in Murle land is Ngantholoch. There the civilians did not cooperate with the forces, hence a confrontation is said to have taken the lives of a number of soldiers and policemen in the hands of the youth who have scattered in the bush. Since the team did not reach that outlying village, the number of deaths, which were claimed by the locals was not confirmed by our JCSG Mobile Monitoring Team.

GREATER AKOBO:

On March 17, the Vice President with the governor and an entourage of ministers and MPs, in company of our Jonglei Civil Society Group team and UN delegations travelled to Greater Akobo area. In Akobo town, the VP and the Governor requested the community of Lou-Nuer to peacefully hand over their guns. Their peaceful request was accepted but with a number of conditions. The head chief of Akobo asked the Vice President and the governor to first give them security before they hand over their guns and threatened to take legal actions if no defence is given in exchange. “We hereby give you our guns, the only hope we have for our defence, but if you fail to defend our community, and should there be any other attacks after the guns collection, we chiefs will get some means of taking the South Sudan government to the International Criminal Court for war crimes,” Chief Yien Chuol of Akobo told the government in his language. After a three hour meeting at Akobo, the delegation split into two, one to Yuai, headquarters for Uror County, and the other to Waat, Headquarters for disarmament forces in Nyirol County.

A member of a "White Army" warns the Minister for Defence, Gen. John Kong Nyuon, in Waat on March 18, 2012: "I've now given away my 'salary' (gun) to you through my chief, not only that but my life. Should we be attacked again here, we know how to recover those guns from your boys very soon!"

In Waat, the crowd turned up to welcome the delegation of the Minister for Defence. They slaughtered a white bull as a sign of homecoming and cleansing, which is widely practiced by the communities of South Sudan. The church was packed with women, men, youth and chiefs who turned up to listen to the briefing by the government visit. The Minister for Defence and other speakers pleaded with the chiefs and the youths to hand over their weapons, stressing the negative effects of the guns on their communities. One Chiefs’ representative cautioned the government against the ongoing attacks by Murle youths on the Greater Lou area despite the present of disarmament soldiers in the villages. From the audience, one boy shot up and made a warning statement, which he directly addressed to the Minister for Defence, Gen. John Kong Nyuon. “I have just given my guns to you (through his chief) this morning. That means I have given away my ‘salary’, but if I hear the Murle youth attacking my village again, we know how to recover the guns from your own soldiers,” he warned. The government assured the crowd that they would give protection.

In Yuai, headquarters for Uror County, the Vice President and the governor, H.E. Kuol Manyang Juuk, addressed the crowd with the same message as in Akobo. Uror is the county where Lou Chief Magicians had been releasing controversial statements against the disarmament exercise and the peace process, which was handled by the Archbishop of the Episcopal Church of the Sudan. Unfortunately, the spiritual leader, Dak Kuoth, did not attend the meeting by the Vice President and the Governor. He and 7 other youth members were reported to have fled the area into the bush for fear of their lives. Sources in the area told our JCSG team that some politicians and other individuals had called the magician and warned him that the Vice President was coming to arrest him, based on the speech of the President, in which he made mention of the Kujur leader who was a stumbling block to the peace and disarmament process. The spiritual leader was reported a day after the government delegations visit to have clashed with the disarmament forces. However, the actual details of the clashes were not clear since no eyewitness was there alongside the SPLA and the spiritual leaders’ men. The JCSG team member who was in Akobo town and another contact point in Uror told the team there was a clash but the chiefs, politicians and other leaders went in and were mediating between the two parties.

Therefore, the JCSG team is hereby calling upon the public, especially the online community of South Sudan, to ignore the propaganda that has been released allegedly by the former late George Athor’s rebel elements. The press release that is going round the world online (Sudan Tribune and South Sudan News Agency) claims that the white army together with the rebels clashed with the SPLA, killing 420 and capturing many vehicles and arms. This is an outright lie intended to confuse the public and give credit to defeated rebels who are desperately seeking alliance with the tribal youth. This report is also dismissing the connection of the rebels and the Lou youth with Murle youth in one objective of overthrowing the governments. That is a shallow propaganda.

Instead, it is the Murle youth who attacked Puokbor village in Nyirol County. The cattle raiders killed three villagers and wounded six others, and took away unidentified number of cattle. Fortunately, the SPLA disarmament forces pursued the attackers and recovered all the cattle, killing six of the attackers instantly. By the time of this media briefing, the forces were still after the surviving attackers. “There was an attack in Nyirol at 1.00AM last night, which left 3 civilians dead, but the attackers were pursued by our forces, under the command of Maj. Gen. Peter Gatdet Yaka and Brig. Gen. Kuai Ajak. Our disarmament forces killed six on the spot and recovered all the cattle. Now, the Lou community are celebrating and congratulating the SPLA,” said Gen. Kuol Deim Kuol, Commander for Operation Restore Peace (ORP) in Jonglei, to the JCSG general secretary in Bor town on Friday, 23 March, 2012.

2- Arms Collected

John Aborcup Akuer (aka: BIHIG MI-5), JCSG peace ambassador and general secretary for Murle Youth for Peace and Development (MYPAD) makes a press statement at the arms collection site at Malual Chaat, Bor, March 14, 2012 (Photos by J. Penn de Ngong).

On March 14, in Bor, the disarmament forces’ commander, Maj. Gen. Kuol Deim Kuol, and the state governor, H.E. Kuol Manyang Juuk, displayed over 4,000 guns to the media and the public at Malual Chaat, an army garrison at the outskirt of the state capital, Bor. According to Gen. Kuol Deim, some of the guns were collected from the stores of police and prisons since there was a strong belief that those guns were not licenced to individuals in the police, prisons and wild life departments. Unconfirmed reports also point to the fact that some individuals had connived with the police to hide their guns in those garrisons stores. The seized arms were stored at the army base of Malual Chaat, about 5 kilometres outside the town. The sight and size of the first catch of disarmament process puzzled everybody, including the governor who confessed, “We were sitting on a time bomb in Bor town,” referring to the huge cache of arms that were collected from the town, most of which could not be accounted for. The arms collected on the first day of disarmament in Bor, which marked the launcing the exercise in the state, include motors, submachine guns, AK47s, pistols and many rounds of munitions, some dating back to the old Sudan times. At a rare display, one soldier wielded a sword, which he claimed he confiscated from one Ethiopian restaurant owner.

Unlike in Bor town, our team could not access and ascertain the number of arms collected from Pibor town and its outside payams because the disarmament process is still ongoing. Nevertheless, we were informed by Nyany Korok, the Murle youth leader, who is one of our contact persons in Pibor, that not many guns were recovered from within the towns because the youth in the towns were not armed. Only 28 guns were collected on the first day of the operation.” He added that the youth who are suspected to be having arms stayed deep in the villages. The disarmament forces are reported to have reached the remote areas of the state by the time this statement was released to the public. Nevertheless, the guns collected at Gumuruk bomas and Pibor, some of which our team witnessed, were reported to be 300.

The disarmament exercise had not kicked off in Akobo town by the time of this press release; however, there is a comprehensive disarmament carried out in Nyirol, Uror and Akobo West as seen by our team in Waat and Yuai. All in all, the number of arms collected in Greater Akobo area could not be verified and confirmed by the time this press release was sent, but estimates from the collection centres put the figure close to 1,000 by March 23. In Twic East, Duk and Pochalla counties, the disarmament exercise just kicked off so the number of the arms collected is yet be confirmed.

In total, the disarmament authorities have estimated over 9,000 guns collected so far. That is slightly half of 20,000, the targeted number of guns the forces are aiming to collect in the entire Jonglei State.

Non-arms Operations                        

Alongside the disarmament operation, Jonglei Civil Society team has discovered other areas of interests during their two-week tour of the counties and villages of Jonglei. First, there are a number of children, women and men who report themselves to the team and ask to be taken along to their communities from where they were abducted in the raids and counter-raids that have rocked the state since the signing of the comprehensive agreement, and which escalated upon the declaration of the independence of South Sudan as a republic.

For instance, in Bichibich boma of Gumuruk Payam, Pibor County, the JCSG mobile team interacted with a man who was abducted 20 years ago from one of the Bor villages he faintly remembered as Athoc-Twic, meaning one of the villages either in Athooch (Bor County) or Twic East County. The man wanted to come and trace his former relatives, but he had no one to leave behind to take care of his two wives, children and cattle. He said he had no intention of permanently returning to his former tribe but would just like to know his roots so that he lives happily. Two women, one Yom from Duk and the other Tabitha from Uror also expressed their feelings to the team members. Yom said she had been walking with the disarmament forces in search of his two sons abducted from Duk in one of the numerous raids carried out by Murle youth from Nanam areas. She fortunately found one of her sons, and is still pursuing the missing one.

However, the disarmament forces were not cooperating enough to sustain her search for the missing one because it is out of their mandate to discover and reunify relatives. In the second week of the operation, one Murle women was recovered with three children from Lou-area. They were handed over to their community through the Governor’s office in Bor. More abductees on both sides of Lou and Murle are desperately looking for ways to go back to their communities. This is a new task the disarmament and also the monitoring teams are facing in the field. Our 45 mobile caravan team will tackle this issue on their mission through the ‘conflict triangle’ most affected by these chronic tribe-based wars.

Besides humans, there are stolen cattle yet to be recovered to their owners. As the disarmament is going on, the marauding youth, especially from Murle, are taking advantage of the disarmament and are raiding cattle from their neighbors. Some of the major incidences of raids took place in Puokbor village of Nyirol County last week and Mathiang village of Bor on Saturday, 24 March, 2012. According to SPLA disarmament commanders and local sources in the area, the cattle stolen from Nyirol and Bor last week were recovered from the raiders by their forces. However, this has created tension and doubt between the communities and the disarmament forces. The major question that has been asked by all the Jonglei tribes during the government tour of the areas is: “What is the guarantee to our security if we give you our guns?” This is a great setback to the operations, which is believed to provide solution to the atrocities the armed civilians have committed among their communities.

 Level of Cooperation among the parties involved.

Jonglei Civil Society Group Secretary General, John Penn de Ngong, makes a role/roll call for the teams of the three peace caravan camps at South Sudan Hotel, Bor. March 25.

The disarmament process, according to the best of our team’s report, was successful because the armed forces and the civil population in Bor, Pibor and Nyirol maintained a good level of tolerance and understanding during the operations on the first one week of the operation. For instance, most people, especially members of the armed forces who were caught off guard or countered outside their duty stations did not resist. Most of the officers from the police, army and wild life services gave up their guns and uniforms, and were later seen claiming their belongings at the operation centres. Even the police themselves, whose stations were raided, gave in their initial resistance.

In relation to that, the commander of Operation Restore Peace (ORP) in Jonglei allowed observers and the media to access the army barracks and the arms depot for the public display of the collected arms. Among the beneficiaries of this cooperation was the Jonglei Civil Society Group, the only local and biggest team that has entered an MOU with the SPLA and State Government to take part in psychological disarmament of Jonglei communities, over the last 10 days. The Commander, Gen. Kuol Dim, has promised more cooperation with civil society to the end of the program. This Memorandum of understanding is to cover the period of disarmament, which will see an independent report from the 30 indigenous organizations and associations in the Jonglei Civil Society Group. Unlike other international and national NGOs that have chosen not to participate in this exercise, the JCSG believes the Phase I of their peace building process is the disarmament.

To conclude, Jonglei Civil Society Group is yet to determine whether the process of disarmament is either forceful or peaceful as the exercise reaches the rural areas, which are expected to be the hotspots of the armed civilians.

For more comprehensive and credible peace-building process, Jonglei Civil Society Group will deploy 45 youths in the ‘Tribal Conflict Triangle’ of Jonglei State this week, the Week III of our operation timetable. The 45 youths, 15 of which have volunteered from each of the major tribes of Lou, Bor and Murle, will be stationed in three rotational peace caravan camps, namely Duk, Akobo (Waat) and Pibor. Each of the three camps is made up of 15 members, 5 of whom represent each of the three greater ethnic groups in the conflict triangle of Pibor, Bor and Akobo. They will recruit 30 more members from the bases, to make 45 from each camp, 15 camp-based and 30 home-based assessment members. There will be a team of 30 heads of organizations, CBOs and county youth associations in the mobile peace caravan team to network the camps during the 45 days of the conflict study process.

For more information, please contact the undersigned.

John Penn de Ngong,  

Secretary General, JCSG,

Bor, Jonglei State.

penndengong@gmail.com

0955 235 997 / 0977 368 888

 

Why She Wants me to Re-publish my Old Republic Here…

"You know that blacks cannot rule themselves. Give them guns and they will kill each other," said P.W. Botha.

One of my blogophiles (blog readers) asked me to publish one of my old flames, which was published online in 2007. I accepted it without ‘why’, and leave the task to you guys to discover the applicability of publishing this post in 2012. One of the reasons to me is that I have got no time to write out new ideas since I am now on the peace caravan move in Jonglei State. My heart is also bleeding upon the bleeding of my new country, contrary to my/our expectation. Please, find out from the post and join me in appreciating Deborah for her request to post this piece of thought on the status quo of the Sudan (now South Sudan and Sudan), as in November, 2007

***.

The Three-Eyed Watchman (November, 2007: www.newsudanvision.com)

By John Penn de Ngong

We, Sudanese, have learned nothing and forgotten nothing from our past experiences

I am not comfortable with those who define history as just the “past records”. They think history dies with our ancestors; but have they died, anyway? If we still rename them in our children, worship them as spirits, and live with their blood running in our veins, then how dead are they, and how long ago is history?

Omar al Bashir, one of the Bourbons of the Sudan that has learned nothing and forgotten nothing from the past mistakes, and also from whom our peoples' surviving liberators have learned nothing and forgotten something from the past oppressions.

The title of this piece is adapted from the history of the French Revolution in which the Bourbon Monarchy that reigned before and after Napoleon Bonaparte is described as “having learned nothing and forgotten nothing” from the experiences of the French autocratic kingdom of Louis VIX and his predecessors and successors. When Napoleon overhauled the whole system in 1789, the subsequent regimes seemed to have learned no lessons and forgotten nothing from the past corrupt, nepotic and despotic monarchs and their systems. They redid all the amendments and plunged their country back into oblivion; hence the description of them having learned nothing and forgotten nothing, meaning they offloaded the changes brought by Napoleon and downloaded the challenges created by the pre-Napoleonic regimes.

In this column, firstly, I want my readers to look at our current issues in three dimensions, say, with three eyes: the first eye on Yesterday, the second on Today, and the third on Tomorrow of the Sudan. Secondly, my readers, whom I assume not only readers but also critic of the status quo of our present Sudan, should cut across history and not read but share whatever I put on this webpage, lest they are misled or they mislead. If so, then please, place the forgetful Bourbons, the French dictatorial kingdom overthrown by N. Bonaparte, and Bonaparte himself, into the current context in Sudan.

I, for one, do not believe there is something called ‘history’, especially in the case of Sudan. I only believe there is a word, not an event, called history. What is historically different in my ancestors (past) giving birth to me, and I (present) giving birth to my son, and my child (future) giving birth to his or her child? That is why we call it – not production but – reproduction. History is the recycling of events, the hourly, daily, weekly, monthly, seasonal, annual recurrences; in short it is the replica of yesterday over today and tomorrow. This is my perspective, as a traumatized and dramatized citizen of Sudan and critic of the Sudanese (South Sudanese after 2010) exotic brand of politics.

They say what comes around goes around; and I complete the saying: what goes around also comes around. Yes, of course, if our chiefs were not bribed or intimidated in that night of 1947, when the Sudan, in general, and Southern Sudan, in particular, were deciding in the Juba Conference, whether to be under the ‘care’ of the British or of the Arabs, the 1955’s Anya-nya I liberation war (yesterday) would not come around. And if the 1972 Addis Ababa Agreement was not trashed by the Nimeiri’s Bourbon sort of…, the 1983’s SPLA liberation struggle (today) would not come around. And if the 2011’s Self-determination referendum (future) would not be rigged or not reached, the 20XX liberation war would not go around. In short, if we learned something from such past experiences and forget nothing from them, then our future is determined.

Now, let’s remind ourselves of the recurring events in our liberation history that we have forgotten and learned nothing from.

1-    The CPA

The Sudanese Comprehensive Peace Agreement signed between the Sudan Peoples’ Liberation Movement/Army in Kenya in 2005 was to bring an end to the two-decade, two-century, two-millennium misery, slavery, oppression, etc. of the Black person in the Sudan, but has it? Has it given us equal sharing of power and poverty (call it property or wealth)? Has it indicated where and when the north and the south meet (border) as signed? Has the CPA removed the Arab occupation army from the South (oilfields) as agreed? Are the original Dinka folks of Ngok (Abyei) Africans or Arabs according to the CPA? Do we, Southerners, know how many we are when the census is being sabotaged by our current colonial masters who assumed being majority in the Sudan? Has the CPA…, now, why waste this space and time with what you even know better than I write. But one important experience we might, and should not, have forgotten is, “is it for the first time? Is the CPA immune from any other micro or macro rebellions when the Khartoum Bourbons fail the peoples of South Sudan, and their allies?” Answers to be evaluated after January, 2011.

2-    The DPA

The Darfur Peace Agreement (or I should say agreementsss) was signed between the same sort of monarchy and the Sudan Liberation Army (Movement) or SLA, not SPLA but its replica, to end the genocidal suffering of the Black people of Darfur in the same old hands in the euphemism of Janja-Weeds. But has it ended the daily multi-death of the Darfur people? Has the DPA given them equal distribution of power? Instead, it has given them, just as to Southerners, equal or greater share of poverty, not property.  Yet they are signing more, and creating additional DPAs when nothing is implemented of the Addis Ababa, N’Djamena and Abuja agreement signed recently, just after the CPA. What bothers me just as it does anyone is why and why the signatories of the DPAs are not learning or forgetting what’s being done to the CPA by the Khartoum regime? They seem to have learned nothing and forgotten something from the past agreements.

3-    The DRA

This is not any other agreement between two parties like the CPA and the DPA. It is the mother of all those agreements, the father of all wars in Sudan. The DRA is my own abbreviation of the Divide-and-Rule Assimilation policy. It is the Arabs all-season old tactic that is as old as their recent history in the Sudan. It is the policy we, African Sudanese, seem to have learned nothing and forgotten something from.

"Do you think the Blacks can rule this country?" Yes We Can, Mr. Botha.

In the South, the DRA policy prolonged our war over two decades. We started in 1983 with one voice, one objective, one heart, one song, one movement and one everything, but a few years later, what happened, especially when they, the political foxes of Sudan got into contact with some of our liberation fighters? We ended up ‘Somalianizing’ our movement into movements based on clans, tribes and regions. Half of the estimated 2.5 million lives lost was not in the frontline with the real enemy, but in a war between Southerners and Southerners. The whys and hows of the puzzle are decoded by somebody who called himself King of Apartheid, the late P. W. Botha, former president of South Africa, in his national address published in the Sunday Times in South Africa on August 18, 1985, reappeared in the Daily Monitor, Uganda, on November 28, 2006, and also used by J. Penn de Ngong (this author) in his anthology of poetry, The Black Christs of Africa, which (guess it) is what Nimeiri and his clique of colleagues might have said when he dumped the Addis Ababa Agreement into the rubbish pit of history.

“Secondly, most Blacks are vulnerable to money inducements. I’ve set special fund to exploit this venue. Money can do anything for you, so, while we have it we should make the best use of it.”

According to Botha also, other tactics of imposing divide-and-rule and assimilation policy can be found in: “The old trick of divide-and-rule is still valid. Our experts should work day and night to set the Black man against his fellowman. His inferior sense of morals can be exploited beautifully. And here is a creature that lacks foresight. There is a need for us to combat him in long term projections that he cannot suspect.” And if you think this statement is bad enough to spoil your day, have a look at more:

“The fact that Blacks look like human beings and act like human beings, do not necessarily make them sensible human beings. Hedgehogs are not porcupines, and lizards are not crocodiles, simply because they look alike. If God wanted us to be equal, he would have created us of uniform colour and intellect. But he created us differently. Intellectually, we are superior…

“It’s our strong conviction, that Black is the raw material for the White man, so let’s join hands to fight against this Black devil. You’ve seen that Blacks cannot rule themselves. Give them guns and they will kill each other. They are good at nothing but making noise, dancing, marrying many wives, and indulging in sex.

“The Black man is a symbol of poverty, mental inferiority, laziness, and emotional incompetence. Isn’t it plausible therefore that the White man is created to rule the Black man? Come to think of what would happen one day if you woke up and on the throne sat a Kaffir? Can you imagine what would happen to our women? Does any one of you believe that the Blacks can rule this country? Hence, we’ve good reasons to let them all – the Mandela’s – rot in prisons, and I think we should be commended for having kept them alive.”

And if you, dear reader, are shaking your head and burning pale with rage, do you think our colonialists are wrong to say so? Why then did we turn guns against each other during the Anya-nya movement, SPLA movement, Darfur movement and even in our current Government of Southern Sudan? What is the meaning of Militias and who are they in the South today? We just refuse to learn, and even if we learn, we tend or pretend to forget as soon as we sigh and sign the so-called agreements.

If you cannot understand my point theoretically, then please do it practically, thus. Dissolve a black colour in a white or red colour, and watch the reaction. What is the product, and do you like it? Can it paint any clear picture? Do this sooner before you cast your vote in the elections and referendum ballot boxes later.

To the Darfurians of the SLA and JEM, and their more than 20 factions which the Khartoum ambassador to UN was boasting of the other day, I thought you have learned and not forgotten anything from the SPLA’s chaos. You should have known before why the SPLA war lasted decades. It’s not because the minority regime in Khartoum was militarily powerful. No, it is because it is economically powerful. Yes, powerful and influential enough to ask one poor and ill-willed freedom fighter to make a project out of his people’s liberation movement and have it founded and funded by Khartoum’s Banki-el-Khasara or the briefcase bank of losses. For the sake of our unity being made attractive, I would not list some of these militia projects that were used for their fellow ethnic cleansing, but God and you and they know their names vividly.  It’s not history; it’s a reality whose scars are indelibly inscribed on the minds and skins of Southerners. Yet we force ourselves to forget it.

According to P.W. Botha, money can do anything for you (or to you), but I doubt if it can erase the memories of oppression and suppression of the black man by the disguised or veiled kings of apartheid of Sudan. And if at all it can, why? And with whose money, by the way? Imagine our own oil from our own soil, with our own toil!

To put this topic in a nutshell, I need not repeat of what we all know. Just refer back to your mental notes and compare them with the above Botha’s speech, which I cannot believe it is Botha’s. It is actually and accurately Bashir’s. For those who have attended Bashir’s speeches, or his colleagues’, from June 1989 to date, haven’t you ever come across such statements in Botha’s speech above? If not, then we can still summarize and derive them from their actions since actions speak louder than words.

Look critically at our history, with three eyes. And do not learn nothing and forget nothing from the Hai Yousif Slums or ghetto life at the suburb of Khartoum (watch out for those Southerners who are still clinging onto the arms of the Arabs and buying houses for residence in Khartoum!), the giving of imaginary big titles on behalf of your people whom you desert in the bush (Minni Minawi, take note and consult with Riek Machar, Lam Akol, and other disappointed Black leaders who once signed ghost agreements with Khartoum and re-redefected). Really I harbor every reason to convince the Darfurians that Minni Minawe’s mini-government under Bashir, that appointment into the imaginary second vice president’s post, will soon turn into a disappointment, hence another defection back into the desert for re-liberation of the black people of Darfur. Let’s wait and see. There will be more liberation struggles upon the birth of our new nation. Inshallah! And then let’s learn something and forget nothing from our past experiences.

This is our oil. It's a lake under our soil. It needs our toil, so that no one can spoil, and by it bring us turmoil. (From "The Jonglei Jongleur & 100 Pennets", by J. Penn de Ngong, this author.)

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Why I had to postpone the 2012 Women’s Day!

One of my yesteryears, even last year, I forgot our Women’s Day. So my lady accused me of having committed an international crime. So I violated the International Women’s Day (IWD). Well, she accused me of the commission of that crime, but I excused myself without submission to that crime. Of course, I did not boycott it; I just forgot it. But that would not take me to The Hague, it would just take me to the ICC (Intranational Celebration Court – I wished so), so that we danced the heart-breaking news away; news of austerity, news of no more oil, news of more soil to toil on; to till as the last resort in the advent or rains.

Again, I did not forget to budget for the celebration of the women’s day today. I just did forego it. I had to postpone it because the government has announced austerity. What is austerity? I do not know. I just feel it. Austerity is a financial hostility, according to me. Austerity, I am made to understand, is a situation when a government in/directly tells you to buy and kiss kissra with bamia instead of chicken and chips, or to buy V4 (call it Rav4) instead of V8. But will we, South Sudanese, really accept it in unison and apply it uniformly? No, not until H.E. 1^st Lt. Gen. Salva Kiir replaces his hiring squad with a firing squad! As I penned this piece, I was interrupted by my friend who came in, fuming, “Look! The Ministry of Electricity and Dams have advertized for the damn V8s again for their directors when Juba is still in the dark, and when the government has announced austerity measures.” I told him jokingly to take his complaints to the Austerity Committee, if at all it is in their mandate to monitor ’budget extravanza and/or V8 bonanza’ of their colleagues over our public funds, especially electricity funds, which is laden with two big institutions, namely: Ministry of Electricity and Damns and South Sudan Electricity Corporation (God knows the difference and the necessity of having both funded at this time when old generators are doing the crickets thing in our townized villages).

I doubt, especially with our luxurious attitudes of kicking off our development with a Hummer, rather than with a hammer. Especially the privileged women, will they accept the budget cut that will see the Hummer parked for lack of fuel? I wonder if anyone cares about and shares in my feelings (without envy) that a hummer for showing off our autonomy is a hammer for chopping off our economy. Without prejudice, again, a Hummer is a ‘harmer’ even to its owner. Please, research before you ask me why and how?

Austerity problem aside, why is it hard for all to celebrate women’s day these days? One of the reasons is this… going back to give an example from my past experience. A day later, I realized that March 8, that I spent on the way to Yay (some mzungu’s spelling for Yei), was the long awaited IWD of 2009. However, I had an excuse for this; an excuse sufficient and efficient enough to make Bensouda Fa…., the female replacement of Moreno-Ocampo, cancel the indictment against my international crime, should there be any.

Reason number one: I, including Elizabeth, am not a signatory to this Decree. I mean we are not witnesses for the Washington or Copenhagen Statute, which was officially declared international in 1911. Hey, those are the times of Adam Smith, even the Adams and Eves of our families were not yet born, leave alone having bought a radio to follow the proceedings of the internationalization of the Day, or were they?

Reason number two: I don’t know the day I was born, and so doesn’t the lady, who is mine. For me, maybe somewhere in the late 70s or early 80s, and for her early or mid 80s, to guess, eyes closed. See now. If we can forget or not know, cannot remember, or cannot celebrate our own birth days, why would anyone want to blame us for having not remembered the 101^st birthday of some Khawaja women’s freedom? To borrow my uncle’s views, ours still is in the pipeline.

Three:  I was not well told. Because in this country, there are too many holidays and holy days— too numerous to remember and budget for. Others find me still seated like last Sunday! Also, I am not dying to excel in 2015. I need more seasons with enough reasons to remember and support it. I mean I need more explanations as to  why I should stay at home and cook while my lady is sitting there trimming her fingernails on the 8^th day of the 3^rd month in the 2012^th year of our Lord.  Yes, you can’t just expect me to do it, just because it is a ritual doable or it is being done in Uganda. And if we are not yet aware of the days, dates and candidates of our 2015 elections,  if we have no consensus in our census figures, then why and how should one blame me for not having observed the international women’s day?

By the way, how did the IWD go down there in Khartoum? Some singing women marching on the streets with front balls bulging out of small bras like frog’s eyes like in Kampala? Or a funeral sort of a long procession by a nun-like crowd as in Mogadishu? Whatever. But I hear the day was welcomed by thunderous protests in our former capital in reaction to a woman gunned down in an attempt to rescue her man being manhandled by the in/famous Public dis/Order Police. I hear the man was accused of having sneaked something alcoholic into his stomach! So beer is more prohibited than drug in Khartoum. (SST Editor, check that this mere mention does not stop our paper from being printed!).

This man is a victim of the newly discovered gender-based violence act in Nyeri, Kenya. Actually, if this were a woman, the whole world would know of it just in one minute, including the Weakleaks! and the Wikileaks. So I call it 'Gender-biased violence', some sort of a domestic violence that has affected men but under the carpet of culturally backed superiority suffering. 'Maendeleo ya Wanaume' oyee!

This year’s IWD theme is: Connecting Girls, Inspiring Futures. For women according to UN, it is: Empower Rural Women — End Hunger and Poverty.” But somewhere out there, our mothers and senior sisters are overdoing it. They have gone to the extent of making it their hobbies to beat their hubbies (husbands), just because they know the man will culturally shy away from going to the media or police with it. Hence, the man-beaters get away with it. Thanks to the brave men of Kenya. They formed their ‘Maendeleo ya Wanaume’, a movement for men’s rights, especially those beaten by their best halves, now worst halves. If you are an ardent addict to world news, you would be amused to hear them (men) shouting for their rights on the BBC like their counterparts of the ‘Maendeleo ya Wanawake’ of the women liberation movement, against men. What a war! And you think I was wrong to postpone my unnecessary spending on the women’s day?

With this rate of prejudice against men by both women and men in favour of the women, I am contemplating our (SS) ‘Tahrir er Rajul’ or something of that kind, just a few years to come. This is because I was disappointed in a funny way the other day when some charming daughter of Eve just walked in and placed herself squarely in front of the son of Adam (aka: Jean Penn), grabbing my turn (like a land-grabber of Gudelle) on the queue that I had maintained by standing for one hour in the bank. “Sorry, but ladies first…” said our attendant as a reply to my signal of complaint.

Yet another reason why I had to forcibly boycott celebrating our Women’s Day was a simple mis/understanding of a question that if the 8^th day of March is isntitutionally and constitutionally assigned to the women, how about the rest of the 365 days? Are they international men’s days? If, at some extremes like in Uganda, a man must cook for his woman on such a day, then what if I am tempted to cook on the 8^th of April or December…will I have committed an offence? About this day, there is a lot more yet to know, especially by our copy-and-paste folks of the third world.

For me to conclude, I have to include the one and only mega problem hindering the South/Sudanese, me included, from remembering, leave alone celebrating, such freedom days. Unless it involves the spiritual intervention of Jesus Christ, Mohammed, and the like, we will not manage to celebrate the Grand Birth Date, the first anniversary, of our Baby Nation, not to mention the 101^st anniversary of our ‘babe notion’, in 2012.  Imagine how many big days we have jumped since 2005. I eavesdropped some women in Bor discussing the reasons for pushing their IWD to another week, maybe Tuesday this week. You see, they have copied our ‘politeachers’, who are addicted to postponing very Big Days which were not fixed by them.

Ignorance, negligence, and such terms, are responsible. That is why St. Paul almost collapsed when he found the Corinthian Christians putting a big signpost in front of their newfound faith’s church: FOR THE GOD WE DO NOT KNOW! That is why some women in Lainya county told me in 2009, “We were just told to come here to celebrate.”  That is why I am leaving you with this problematic and dilemmatic debate between my daughter and yours, Jane and Janet, in ‘The Sabbath for Mama’, one of my 350 poems in a title called “The Black Christs of Africa”, being serialized for the South Sudan Tribune Daily between March 12, 2012 and March 13, 2013.

NB: To know more about when, where, why and how this day came to be adopted by our today’s women, click this leaklink:

Footnote:

To my esteemed readers, especially those who have been imploring me not to save my essays on my personal computer or personal blog but publish them for public consumption, I am back to the media, back with a big bang. Breaking news: I have fallen in love with the South Sudan Tribune! So let’s meet again on this page tomorrow, and daily, not forgetting my weblog, The Weakleaks! weekly: www.weakleak.wordpress.com

E-mail: penndengong@gmail.com

***

This is the periodic Serialization of the poetry book, “The Black Christs of Africa”, by J. Penn de Ngong.

*

Poem 65

*

The Sabbath for Mama  

*

Hey Buddy,

Do you know that?

Mummy has only one day,

One and only single day,

Or only one simple say,

One singing, semi day,

Out of all 366 days,

To rest,

But not to resist

A call

From the routinely hunger quake

That has its epicentre

In the belly valley

Of my cross-legged daddy,

And my hand-folding bros.

Being her only baby daughter,

I sometimes shed tears,

And just wish, just,

I turn ten

To take over

And let mama celebrate her unholy Sabbath.

Why weren’t I twenty, thirty, forty, fifty…

To decode the riddle and the pity

On her subjective responsibilities,

To ask if Baba owns the other 364 and so days?

If so,

Then it means…

Mama has only seventy days

To rest and celebrate her freedom,

If – God forbids— she had to die at seventy.

There is this other day, too,

June 16 for us children,

Like March 8 for women,

Like May 13 for mothers,

Unlike Jan. 1 – 31 Dec. for men,

Who claim to be our fathers and brothers.

Tomorrow I’ll ask

My Sunday school teacher

Or the other black man in white

That who assigns the days and duties.

Hey Jane,

You’ll get the same answer

That my teacher told me last Sunday.

That what, Janet?

That our great, great grand, grandma,

Long, long, long ago,

Made a mistake in the garden…

Stop! I now know,

It’s the politricks of the male politeachers.

But which president can fix the days forever?

Any. Even that of our family,

Or of our country,

Or of our universe.

But I think the Lord of Sabbath,

The very God of Sabbaoth,

Knows women’s rights, too, doesn’t he?

I think let’s first grow up,

And go to school,

And become no longer small

To ask and know, but big,

Big enough to know and ask,

And ask where, when, why, what, who, how…

*

Poem 122

*

 Woman beings, real human beings

*

Treat us humane.

Women are human.

Not only males are urbane.

Why mostly men are urban?

We are wimmin,

Why treat us as vermin?

Why make us underdogs,

Yoking us with loads of logs!

So conditioned that when our gods enter homesteads,

Wielding their clubs, clearing their throats with threats,

“You women, who is at home?” Then very slowly and lowly

In unison we echo, “Sorry, nobody at home, it’s we women only!”

Now what animal is a human,

And who co-created human beings?

Is it not woman, regarded not human?

So woman beings are really human beings.

Now what mammal is a woman?

W.O.MAN means not ‘Wife of Man”.

In this world of masculinism vs. feminism,

Better call us wimmin, the best euphemism.

*

Poem 5

*

Martin Luther King II

*

Martin Luther is King,

He’s not a losers’ king.

The seeds of freedom he has sown,

The seat of reformation he has shown,

Like the white Martin, Luther I,

Who filtered Protestantism from Catholicism,

The Black Martin Luther II,

Fostered protectionism against Racism.

*

It was from his footstep

In 1955 that Rosa Park,

Of Southern USA, Rose not to pack

For a white passenger.

Turning into a wild messenger,

She defied the white man

And defined the black man

In the history of mankind inAmerica

With the story of man coming from Africa.

*

It was from her footstep

That women put their fullstop

To mark their marginalization,

To make their realization

In the world all of a sudden.

Like Katipa Banat of South Sudan,

Since 1955, the women battalions,

Warrior wives of battle lions,

Who played their roles in the fights,

Paid and paved the way for their rights.

*

Relevant Quote

It is better to be the widow of a hero than the wife of a coward.

Dolores Ibárruri (1895 – 1989)

Spanish politician and journalist.

 

Mediaphobia Dilemma in South Sudan: MPs Stranded at the Crossroads of Media Law for Freedom of Expression or Vengeance Law for Freedom of Oppression

"Mr. Speaker, our committee has found out that this man called Mading Ngor is not a journalist working with Bakhita Radio, but a freelance journalist. Also when we cross-checked with the Security, we found out that he does not have an ID and always fails to identify himself at the gate," charges read out to the parliamentary session on Mading Ngor by Hon. Joy Kwaje, Chairperson of Information Committee. Ok, I hereby challenge Hon. Dr. Marial Benjamin, Minister for Information, now holding Mading's hand in this picture a few minutes after Mading made H.E. Raila Odinga recite his 'Wake Up Juba' slogan, to come out and confirm these improper propaganda from his colleagues of our House of Laws.

I am breaking my last silence on this Media-vs-Government violence because I have been perturbed psychologically and disturbed physically by my media comrades for being neutral when the war is now central in our midst. Since  my fighting by writing hit the block by the time no papers and websites were there to fight for me, I hit the blog. And the reason is simple: they are bibliophobes, sort of allergic to reading, especially the internet stuff. So we, the internet staff, I say we the blogophiles, hide it therein, meaning herein, online.

However, I am afraid, the ‘mediaphobia’, the anti-media attitudes by our government, will greatly feature in our constitution, and will definitely override the minority rights to expression such as through the blogsphere, Facebook, Twitter, and other internet-based group of socialites. And this, should it happen due to real or forged ignorance by our lawmakers, will force the dotcommers into staging an online kinda Facebook Revolution. Of course, if the Egyptian girls and boys electronically won to put the Mighty Hosni Mubaraks onto his knee, and then into the hot soup, then who won’t anywhere in this global village? Let us just wait and see what the Media law will look like in the hands of the lawmakers-turned-mediaphobes.

But my blog and I loathe it. To repeat what my blog is about so as to distance myself from Julian Assange, this is what I wrote previously in my weekly weakleak post, which does not only make a part but also make a parcel of the freedom of expression. “I hate political weaklings. That is why I wrote on the intro of my blog above: ‘Really, I rarely enjoy politics; but when some wannabes play poly-tricks, I would rather I were their hangman.’ This statement also echoes what this weblog is about (from the Aboutleaks page): ‘In South/Sudan today, our readers, our leaders and other senior citizens and their junior denizens in the aftermath of the conflict seem to be oscillating between words of war and war of words. Such leaders who lose their hearts in loose utternaces are to be crucified ’weakleakly‘ (like USA  on the in/famous Wikileaks.com) on the altar of their tongues.”

Who are the political weaklings? Anybody who claims to be a politician or a ‘politeacher’ but have not prepared themselves for the game. Take it or leave it from me today, mere votes do not add any iota of idea of politics. So those whose fellow villagers just stuffed their ballot boxes and sent to Juba in 2010 must struggle now to pull up their socks in accordance with today’s global leadership demands. For instance, lack of preps before hitting the public roads with hot news is seen in our lawmakers’ behaviour when their bodyguards (I thought those were their building guards) dragged on the floor one of our respected learned journalists of this naive nation.

On his talk show on Friday last week, I asked Mading Ngor if he, according to the one-sided investigation committee in and for the parliament, is drunk throughout, is violent in the hall, is not qualified, is a freelance journalist, does not identify himself, and the likes…. For fear of roughing his Bakhita FM Management the wrong way, and/or fuelling the fiery venom of the legislators, he did not answer my barrage of rage on air but told me at the end of the program. “I wake up before Juba wakes up, start my ‘Wake up Juba’ at 6AM and stop it at 8AM. I go for shower and breakfast at 9 and hit the road to the parliament at 10 (all these in the morning), and stay there till they close their session. Now where and when do I get drunk throughout?” (Quote not verbatim).

Biblically speaking, my Christianity timetable reads ‘Lent’. This reminds us of the miscalculation the Roman colonial administration did in Judaea when the Holy Spirit’s chaos descended on the believers. The Christians began to speak in tongues (confused language not understood by outsiders) and the authoritarian authorities were offended to the extent of accusing them of being drunk, forcing Simon Peter, the senior apostle, to react, “This is only 9 o’clock in the morning. Where do you think these Christians could get alcohol?” Rt. Hon. Speaker, are we there yet? Hon. Joy Kwaje of the Information (now media) Committee, there you are!

But Honorable MP, Madam, with your current position as our Information Committee head lawmaker, and with your former position as the boss for South Sudan Human Rights Commission, is this report of the ad hoc investigation committee on the attack on the journalist, the humiliation in the house of law that you witnessed, regretted and apologized for on Tuesday, true as you reported to the Speaker on Wednesday? “Mr. Speaker, our committee has found out that this man called Mading Ngor is not a journalist working with Bakhita Radio, but a freelance journalist. Also when we cross-checked with the Security, we found out that he does not have an ID and always fails to identify himself at the gate.”

Mading Ngor at one of his daily routines, recently harassed and embarrassed, and then accused of being a 'freelance journalist who has no identity'...Hmm, our laws and their makers!

Madam Chairperson, I have a litany of questions to ask over this small quote from your committee, but only if I do not run out of space. That Mading Ngor is not a journalist working with Bakhita FM, Really? That he is a freelance journalist, so what is constitutionally and professionally wrong with me being a freelance reporter? That he has no ID (I thought you mean idea) card, so how does he earn his monthly salary from Bakhita and makes appointments with leaders such as Pagan Amum, Kenyan Prime Minister and the East Timore Prime Minister? That Mading Ngor does not accept to identify himself at the gate. If so, then how does he enter, and why has your security allowed him to attend the sessions for the last five months? That the security told your committee so; then what did Mading tell the committee? Or was your committee only to investigate the security boys, and why leave out Mading, the centre of the problem? The rest of the queries for our leaders are upto my readers.

In this country where we seem to be failing to identify the real drunkos and the cause thereof, it is unbecoming for those in the hall of laws to force their fellow citizens into submission so that a speck is removed from their eyes by the persons who have even a bigger log in theirs. If I had to be allowed to enter the August House with a breathalizer and test the fuming gases (breaths) from the lips and noses of all the over 300 honourables, their body guards — building guards not spared, too — I believe, Mading Ngor Akech Kuai will not top the list of the drunkards (drinkers being an understatement) in our parliament.

That aside, when the citizens of our baby nation get drunk with the spirit of nationalism (say freedom of expression), our parliament blatantly accuse them of having been intoxicated with the spirit of alcoholism (freedom of oppression). Now, what is the new label to give to the spirit that made our parliamentarians too drunk to make such wild decisions like accusing a competent scribe of impersonation if not forgery, banning a legally licensed reporter from executing his duties in the parliament, releasing unprocessed propaganda against him, in other words, defaming him as an uneducated freelance journalist, drunkard, and so on. By the way, the term ‘drunkard’ was not used by the parliament but its definition qualifies it. Simply put, a drunkard is one who is under the influence of alcohol — and to borrow from the MP’s description — throughout! So when an honorable lawmaker justifies in public that their bodyguards were right to beat the journalist because he comes to the parliament ‘drunk throughout’, the time adverb ‘throughout’ makes me comfortable with the word ‘drunkard’.

I repeat, what on earth did our lawmakers drink that day to make them rush into banning the media (I harbour the feeling that an attack on one Mading is an attack on the whole media, by the way), propagating false charges (the same charged against Jesus and his followers) against the qualified journalist who did not only study in Canada but worked there as he founded the famous newsudanvision.com website, which has also published this piece of argument. It should be noted that this is not only the very website but also the very journalist who made Aleu Ayieny Aleu lost his job of a deputy minister of interior on an SPLM ticket in Khartoum during the interim period. Correction: He did not make him lose his job, he did make him lose his mind and loose his tongue to speak out words not recommended for a constitutional post holder at a time the nation was struggling out of its colonial cocoon.

The Mading Bill

Period! The parliament was drunk with the spirit of vengeance. According to Mading, it seems to be Hon. Aleu who diverted the whole parliament session on a more sensible Media Bill into discussing ‘Mading Bill’. What else, if not personal interest, was Hon. Aleu or Hon. Kom Kom’s interest in forcing the legislators to discussing Mading Ngor the whole day instead of the Media? This was condemned by Mading himself during his ‘Wake up Juba’ breakfast show the morning after he was harassed and embarassed. “For the parliament to discuss me the whole day, while there are demanding issues on the table, is outrageous!” This also reminds me of President Robert Mugabe (of Zimbabwe)’s reaction to the brutish British Parliament. “The British parliament to discuss Mugabe for the whole week…what an idleness!”

The old guards seem to say, "Young man, shut up before you are shut/shot down!" Will we? No/oN!

Instead of the Media Bill, it was the Mading Bill. And what came out of the ‘bill’? Banning Mading from attending ‘their’ parliamentary sessions, countering the story with (unresearched) propaganda that made Hon. Kwaje a stooge who was forced to switch from a sincere apologist on Tuesday to a staunch propagandist on Wednesday. Imagine the head of Information (Media) Committee reversing her apologies into accusations on an incident that should have been a problem of the in/famous in/security personnel of the Assembly (I can now excuse one reporter who misspelled it ‘security personals’). If I were that parliamentary propagandist, I would give a brief comment to dispel the whole hullabaloo of the public and world media from the ir/responsibility of the top institution of our nation. “We are sorry, this is a mistake made by the few security individuals, and it will be investigated and dealt with accordingly.” The ‘accordingly’ means according to the parliamentary rules and regulations, which do not necessarily warrant a beating to the extent of tearing one’s outfit and exposing one’s ‘infit’. This statement would relieve the whole house from shouldering the whole blame. This is the kind of a disclaimer that the editors simply do to harsh articles, “The views expressed herein do not necessarily reflect the policies of this newspaper or website…” The parliament should have done the same.

But why did they do not the same? Conflict of interest. Mading Ngor is the journalist who interviewed Hon. Aleu Ayieny in USA (now chairperson for Security Committee under which the rude boys fall in the NLA) by the time he was an inferior minister of interior in Khartoum. The interview, published on the New Sudan Vision website on 31st October 2007 and 1st November 2007, a diaspora-to-home media outlet for which Mading is a co-founder and editor-in-chief to date, was picked up by The Daily Monitor in Uganda. The story in which Aleu insinuated that Garang was murdered caused un/diplomatic row between Uganda and South Sudan, leading to SPLM sacking Aleu and everything of that kind. So when Aleu calls Mading a trouble maker everytime he appears in the parliament, the 10 counts of crime Mading had allegedly committed against the national assembly, that include drunkenness and stubbornness, are unlimited to ‘crime against the honourable member/s of parliament’. I remember how hard a nut to crack in this honourable member when I dogged him for three days in 2004 to interview him about the upcoming international landmine symposium in Nairobi. That time, Mr. Aleu was the boss for New Sudan Mine Authority and I was an intern with the UN/OCHA’s IRIN (Integrated Regional Information Networks). I succeeded but not without waylaying him at his family doorstep and answering his pre-interview questions to clarify myself if I was not there with a young man’s motives… fill in the blanks…!

According to the article on the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) that interviewed Mading Ngor after the beating, “This case is getting unwarranted media attention,” Ngor says, given that such incidents happen all the time in South Sudan. “I remember last September the security almost murdered me for taking a picture in the assembly.” Later he found that there was no official protocol banning photography in the assembly hall. Indeed, South Sudan has already developed a reputation for allowing security operatives to abuse civilians with impunity, including journalists. CPJ documented nine cases of security attacks against journalists last year; in two cases the journalists had to be hospitalized for treatment.

It is a fact now known internationally that, whereas media freedom is one of the most important ingredients of practical independence and, indeed, a litmus test for democracy, South Sudan is the world’s youngest republic that has no media laws, according to the country profile on Wikipedia in reference to the arrests and closure of the newspaper last year in connection with the widely questioned wedding of the president’s daughter. That is why I wonder under which laws and whose laws will the parliament apply to sue one pen-wielding Nhial Bol, the citizen of this media-outlawed country, and editor-in-chief of The Citizen, the newspaper. We, media practitioners here, are protected by international media laws and Article 19 of the Universal Human Rights Declaration on freedom of expression. I hear as they were discussing an impromptu bill on Mading Ngor, the end result was to rush in the long-stalled media bill. Watch this space for more about that next week, if at all this blog will survive that ‘vengeance law’ being passed into action.

The Media Bill

In the newly independent Republic of South Sudan, as we pass every new year with expectations that they may legalize us, they pass very new rules shrinking the chances of the journalists narrower and narrower as the rest of the world moves on towards a wider freedom of expression and association.

The Media Bill is five-years old and is not yet graduated into the Media Law! What makes it the oldest raw law (bill) in the Republic of South Sudan, if not in the whole world? I gather that it is undergoing maturity check up in between the ministries of Information, Justice and the Council of Ministers. Funny enough! By the time Mading was attacked, our lawmakers were busy on more urgent issues of building the nation. To be exact, they were deliberating on a Red Cross, Red Crescent and Red Crystal Bill, which were debated three times during the last three months’ time! Well, the Red Cross is also important because we all need first aid, especially these days when we are swelling with fat like bread inflated with yeast. We need the Red Cross to rush ‘second aid’ to Pi/bor victims. I also need this blated first aid I call ’second aid’; Yeah, I need the rescuers when I am attacked by our in/security personnel. I need personal aid when I faint while recording the prolonged speeches of our leaders (say readers in this case) in parliament or under the hot sun at our ‘Freedom Squares’ around South Sudan. So the Red Cross Bill that was passed before the Mading Bill, and the Engineers Bill graduated into law the day after the Mading’s (beating) Bill, needed more urgency than the Media Bill does now, which is always scheduled to a date called ‘next time or later’.

Some mini-sters or legis-laters who have not or have too much enough information about the role of the media regulation laws think they are being forced to sign their arrest warrant, not knowing that it is their rest warranty in disguise. “Imagine how rampant these boys are at the moment, what if you legalize their anarchist behaviour, the so-called media bill?” wondered one army general in a private chat with other senior citizens in a conference during the days of the Nhial Bol Bill. Yes, Mading is not the first and will not be the last one to be discussed by the government. Instead of discussing the laws that will guide the individuals from mis/behaving in public, they wait until there is a ‘crime’ and then they discuss the ‘criminal’ and crucify them on the calvary of ignorance and revenge. In the recent past, there have been many Madings in the spotlight as listed in this piece of contemplation from my fellow blogger Paanluel Wel’s site.

“So far, among those South Sudanese who have had the misfortune to cross paths with the authorities are Nhial Bol of the Citizen Newspaper, Dengdit Ayok of the Destiny newspaper, Dr. James Okuk who is a freelance writer and a fierce critic of the government, Ngor Garang and Manyang Mayom of Sudan Tribune, Mac Ajuei Panchol from Bor, Richard Mogga and Badru Mulumba of the New Times, Ojja William Benjamin from Eastern Equatoria State, and the latest victim, Mading Ngor of New Sudan Vision and Bakhita FM. Not only that, even South Sudan government own undersecretary, Dr. Jok Madut of the ministry of Culture and Heritage, was beaten up on the new year’s eve at Wau airport just because he arrived at the same time as the president. This is only the tip of the iceberg as many low-profile media personnel who bear constant harassments and intimidations from the law enforcement agents and grumpy politicians go unreported.” http://paanluelwel2011.wordpress.com/2012/02/09/frosty-relationship-between-the-new-government-of-south-sudan-and-the-national-news-media

What Paanluel Wel has exactly described above happens not only to the media workers but also to ordinary citizens, including the extraordinary ones such as H.E. Dr. Jok Madut Jok, quoted verbatim on his testimony in which he was made to regret having his flight coincided with that of our president, the man who swore him into the office: ”In my free country, South Sudan, there is very little such thing as freedom. This the morning of December 31st, I arrived in Wau, hoping to celebrate the reception of the new year with my family, I had the misfortune of arriving at Wau airport on the same day that our President was also due there, coming from his Christmas holiday in Akon…

“When I got out of the airport compound and walked to the vehicle that was waiting for me, I found that my two brothers were attacked and being beaten by an SPLA unit, supposedly stationed there to secure the airport for the arrival of our President. Naturally, I walked over to see why they were being beaten and the soldiers automatically turned on me. I was brutally attacked, my arms tight by several men, a blow to the side of my head with the butt of a gun and several punches straight onto both of my eyes, no questions asked, not even any accusations of wrong doing. I was tortured properly while I had quickly shown the soldiers my identity card, demonstrating that I am a senior official in the national government, undersecretary in the Ministry of Culture, and the ID was thrown away and several men wrestled me to the ground, onto that red dust of Wau, my blue suit and all…” Reader, I wourld rather you come back to complete this story later on this link: http://gurtong.net/ECM/Editorial/tabid/124/ID/6272/Default.aspx

The game is simple but ample, in such a government-vs-media war, if they tie your hands, use your mouth, if they tie your mouth, use all the other means at your disposal, including solidarity. In this way, you will outdo them, and they definitely will undo you.

As for the fairness of the parliamentarians in enacting healthy freedom laws amidst their arm-twisting duel with their controversially estranged sibling, the Media, the so-called Fourth Estate of the nation, let us wait and see. But before we waste our time waiting to see, why don’t we join in the process of shaping that law? I am not convinced, just as you might not have been, that somebody who has already declared me an enemy will wish me good by enshrining for me in the national constitution a licence to criticize them. Who has a gun and does not use it against their assailants? The Politicians already see the media as their major threat, so will they deal with it objectively as a law of the future generation in that piece of one-sided legislation being pushed in at a time when the House is bracing for solidarity with their security at the expense of real democracy?

This daylight partiality is already seen in the way the honorable speaker formed an investigation committee, comprising members of parliament and the very security personnel, who investigated themselves and published the results worldwide. Mading, the victim, was dismissed and not questioned to tell his version of the story. This has made the parliament behave like the Shari’a law implementers, who declare a fatwa for the stoning of an adulteress, the execution in which the adulterer participates. This immunity by impunity should not be allowed in our new country. Our leaders should not break the hearts of the people whom they successfully liberated, and whom they are now remorselessly ‘de-liberating’ in their own independent country.

However, before I throw the ball to my fellow comrades in the new jungle of struggle, I have my own recommendations to put across. I believe in the Nigerian artistes’ (P Square) principle, “If you do me, I do you… Touch me, I touch you!” This is not necessarily on a negative note, though. You may touch me softly, then I do it likewise. But if you do me hard, I do you harder. Hence, the way you (they) feel this Mading’s post-beating trailer. I absorbed this from a Kenyan friend and observed it in action by the time I was doing my internship with the UN’s IRIN (Integrated Regional Information Networks) after enrolling in a journalism course for The Sudan Mirror in 2004. He told me that the secret by which they transformed some stubborn leaders is by counter-censorship. If, say, a minister proves to be giving hard time to journalists, just boycott him or her. If not, then attend his daily blabberings and edit them ‘properly’, I mean properly! In this way, some obstinate diehards of the Big Man will be humbled to the extent of calling for reconciliation with the media fraternity. Of recent, have you ever heard in Kenya the likes of the First Lady slapping journalists in public any more?

Barrage of Rage from Media Comrades

Dear Hon. Dr. Ben Ali, sorry I mean, Hon. Dr. Ben-jamin, do not allow them to ben-d...rather... ban-d us, please.

Though ‘photojournalists’ lost their professional courage on the scene of their comrade’s humiliation, chose to cower about and cow away from capturing the scene on their cameras, our writers and reporters were not quiet with this development. I thank them and join them in calling for a new dawn with the media for development. I know we have weaknesses, which should be excused like the normal shortcomings seen with other stakeholders of the new nation. I acknowledge I have weaknesses as a person, but I with my colleagues condemn here is why they are being branded as wickednesses by the holier-than-thou politicians. Now have your judgmental look at the personal takes of my comrades in the profession on this hot issue.

Tom Rhodes, CPJ’s East Africa consultant, based in Nairobi, has this to say on their organization’s weblog, “The ensuing furor included apologies, a protest, an opinion column, a committee investigation, parliamentary debate, the banning of Ngor from the assembly, and finally, a parliamentary call to revive deliberations over three media bills originally drafted five years ago. While some journalists see the resurrection of those proposals as a silver lining, others — including Ngor — are worried that debate over the bills in this heated atmosphere may spell trouble for press freedom in the world’s newest country.” http://www.cpj.org/blog/2012/02/attack-on-south-sudan-reporter-sparks-critical-deb.php

“Without media laws we are like footballers playing without rules, and what happens is that anybody can blow the whistle and say these are the rules — his rules,” said Jacob Akol, chairman of the Association of Media and Development in South Sudan, which supports the laws’ passage.

“Media freedom in South Sudan is fading due to persistent harrassment and intimidation against journalists. There were several incidents that happened to Journalists and are still happening in the same way. The latest case is the worst which makes the whole Government in Juba decided to protest against Madding Ngor. As a Journalist of this country, I am totally in distress because Democracy is being killed by backpain politicians. Reporting on sensitive issues, especially government failures, has become like milking a Lion in South Sudan.” Joseph Oduha in a trail comment to the CPJ blog article.

“I am of the view that this incident has set the launching of the struggle between those in the halls of power and those who love freedoms, including of expression, because what was attacked was [not only] an individual, but freedom of expression as well as the bill of rights,” Chief Editor Nhial Bol of the private daily Citizen, wrote in a scathing column. The editor was admonished by MPs for claiming in his op-ed, incorrectly, that they were “celebrating the beating of our colleague.”

The parting shot of this article is from Columnist Zechariah Manyok, who also voiced his concerns in the Sudan Tribune recently. “What guarantee will the media have that the bill is not going to be based on the anger of the Assembly, making it a law against the media [rather] than a law meant to regulate the activities of the media?” http://www.sudantribune.com/The-crux-of-Mading-s-case-against,41554

 

To Ocampo: I and Shari’a want Bashir’s hands off before he goes to ICC or commits Suicide!

I hate political weaklings. That is why I wrote on the intro of my blog above: “Really, I rarely enjoy politics; but when some wannabes play poly-tricks, I would rather I were their hangman.” This statement also echoes what this weblog is about (from the Aboutleaks page): “In South/Sudan today, our readers, our leaders and other senior citizens in the aftermath of the conflict seem to be oscillating between words of war and war of words. Such leaders who lose their hearts in loose utternaces are to be crucified ’weakleakly‘ (like USA  on the in/famous Wikileaks.com) on the altar of their tongues.” This theme is justified by the following loose utterances by President Bashir, himself, quoting Islamic law (Shari’a) on the crime of stealing or the likes, in an incidence that happened around October 10, 2010.

THE FATE OF PICKPOCKETS IN SUDAN: South Sudanese in Khartoum, if you are still waiting for the donkey salaries from the National Islamic Front (NIF/NCP) masters, you will either come home with a gun to shoot your brothers. Failure to do that, you will return to us useless i.e. minus your hands!

“…those in disagreement should review their understanding of religion because Islamic Shari’a law “has always stipulated that one must whip, cut, or kill”.

Hm, this is — allow me to call it — ‘oral farting’. To be more obscene, or even off scene, those who fart through their anal doors should be naturally forgiven for carelessly releasing foul gas, but those who fart orally should be nationally crucified on the calvary of their mouths. I remember one of the Jongleyans (from Duk County of South Sudan) sang: ”…kɔc wäl köth ë yom de kölöŋ, arac, arac, lɔ kɔc wɔɔk Jölöŋ!” (meaning: He poured the folks his Monsoon (hot winter) wind that smells terribly untill it went and poisoned at Jollong…!” (Imagine the distance between his village and Jollong village!). Apologies requested from those touched by this piece of Dinka literature, quoted for the purpose of warning our Jongleyans in most particular, Southanese in particular and Sudanese in general terms that this is the winter, and whatever foul air the hot winter wind is blowing in from the northerly direction must not be allowed to poison our people at Jollong (the meeting point at AkoBor and PiBor counties of the tribal triangle of tribulations in Jonglei State). The same warning must apply to South/Sudanese on both sides of the border, yes, those imaginary lines.

Bashir and Bashar are in trouble this year (say these years). Bashar al Assad (Syria) survived UN’s noose by a whisker of Russia’s double standards, or by a whisky of the In/security Council’s drunken democrazy. Russia wants Bashir (al Hassan) who is votted for ICC to be vetoed like Bashar al Assad so that they settle their cases at Moscow instead of at the Hague, but that is very vague, very opague and very fake indeed.

However, my request to Mr. Moreno Ocampo and the Hague’s guys to allow us handle Omar al Bashir domestically is different from that of the AU (I hear African UNION!). My name is Jean Penn, the South Sudanese, not Jean Ping, the Gabonese. The difference is that Jean (pronounced like John not like Jeans) Ping is the AU’s Chairman and I, Jean (a French for John) Penn, am the AU’s cheer man. I just do the cheering up, but this time, his (AU’s) decision has left me just jeering as he takes over the role of a cheerman, a tyrants’ sycophant. As for me and my fellow bystanders, we shall play a psycho-fans’ role to the international political tournament (reads torn-up men) between the Man-chaser United and the Liver-fool foodbowl championship. 

The bunch of dictators in the AU, who are just watched by the bunch of spectators in the UN, have launched yet another lobby to have Bashir’s arrest warrants on 11 Big Crimes cancelled so that he goes on doing his thing. Ocampo, are you there?  Take note, your substitute that is taking over this June is not only an African but also a woman! No offence intended, women please. I mean, my lord, Fatou Bensouda, who is to carry on with the criminals’ files from Moreno as ICC Prosecutor may develop the ladies’ syndrome  (motherly mercy), the brand of forgiveness backed up by her fellow African dictators who do not wish to see themselves tricked into trickling in one by one, beginning with Bashir, I mean with Gba-Gbo!

What the Shari’a Dictates

Since President El Bashir has pre-condemned himself using the Shari'a law, which he violated by stealing money from the oil of the Republic of South Sudan, he must go to The Haque minus his hands, since he is the first advocate of the domestic court and the same time the same thief caught 'red-handed'.

I hear the political weaklings in Khartoum are calling for full inclusion and strict execution of Shari’a laws in Sudan. If you think the term ‘weakling’ is undiplomatic language against that in/dependent nation, then why for Allah’s sake did the Shura (Juba Arabic: Sura i.e. picture), the Islamic Shari’a Ulumah, a vigilante council that assumes supremacy above the legislative body in Khartoum, want to impose Shari’a at a season when they themselves are pickpocketing their neighbour’s oil money?

In November 2011, Bashir ordered his parliament to rubber-stamp a bill to steal (‘confiscate’ they say) the South Sudanese (Southanese) oil to top up their deficit budget. A legislated theft! That has regretably boomeranged on Khartoum. What does Sharia dictate about stealing a neighbour’s property? Without much ado, this is it, from the Gospel according to Al Bashir:

” Islamic Shari’a law “has always stipulated that one must whip, cut, or kill”, said Bashir.

As if that is not enough, he went on lecturing to justify why his law yes-sayers should stone or flog women in an improptu open court presided over by none other than ‘His Lordship, Justice Bolice’ (any police constable) at the city centre.

“These days some people are talking about the girl that was lashed in accordance with a penalty of Allah’s penalties…..for those who say they are ashamed of this [punishment] they should wash up, pray twice and revert back to Islam. If the girl was sentenced to flogging and the police carried out the verdict, what is the probe for then?” Bashir told the harvest celebrations at Al-Gadarif state in East Sudan, as he was launching his unmanned surveillance plane (drone) made in Sudan (an euphemism for Iran?). He said this in December, days before the referendum polls.

Why was the girl in question lashed in public? They say she was not dressed up the way their women do. How do they do? They roll ( or are rolled) up in coloured or black cloth so that they look like bodies ready for burial. So if a wayward girl is not clothed and/or closed up likewise, she is beaten up by the law enforcers. As if that is not enough, if a girl is seen dashing somewhere into the dark angle with a lover or a lookalike sort of…, she is declared a dark angel, hence pre-sentenced to death penalty by stoning in a city square by all the passersby. Juba girls still malingering in Khartoum, do not say later that I did not tell you, o…!

Bashir is not guilty of that. He is guilty of stealing, stealing Southanese oil, stealing Southanese soil, and stealing his Northanese money, the rests on the litany of crimes up to Ocampo. By this accusation, I am not politicking. I have evidences, including this complaint from one Namaa Faisal al Mahdi, a Northanese female activist. Need also I quote H.E. Salva Kiir on the Southern financial figures stolen by the Northern political figures? No, except to draw His Excellency’s attention on the percentages allocated to the presidential spending thus: 

“Sudan is currently undergoing a deep economic crisis caused by the loss of over 75% of its oil revenue after the south became an independent country as well as poor management of governmental finances, a civil war in Darfur, South Kordofan and Blue Nile State as well as excessive governmental spending on the army police and national security services, estimated at nearly 30% of the forecasted 2012 annual budget , spending in presidential affairs estimated at nearly 5% , whilst spending in all basic necessary services such as education, health and support for business and agriculture estimated was forecasted at less than 1.2 %.” .

Away from the president’s corruption of having 5% shares of the 40 million minions’ income, come back the crime according to Shari’a. Shari’a law in principle is supposed to be applied on any citizen of that Islamic country. This is not so in Khartoum. Shari’a is implemented squarely on the third class citizens in that country. That is why one Sarah Abuk Lual (they called her Abuk Luwal), a Dinka girl, was sentenced to stoning in Khartoum when she was suspected to have been mysteriously impregnated about 10 years ago, by the time one Amina Lawal was facing the same Sharia stones in Northern Nigeria. Can anyone remember if the Christian NGOs and rights groups succeeded in serving the lives of those women and their unborn babies?

Why is it that when an emaciated street kid picks the the pregnant pocket of a rich man in town, his hand is cut off? No vice versa! I have ever sighted on TV the daughter of Dr. Trouble (Dr. Al Tourabi) dressed in a funny pair of trousers. I waited eagerly to hear news about her being caned in public the following morning. Nothing! Can”t you also believe Al Mahdi’s daughter has some queer leggings and tight jeans in her wardrobe now? I hear from my lawyer cousin that this thing called law is so stupid that if you narrowly killed your neighbour with a bullet from your tongue (e.g. the I-am-going-to-kill-you warning) or with a bullet from the tongue of your gun, you are equally taken in for one class of crimes called ‘Attempted Murder’. Similarly, if a Shamasha in Khartoum or a street boy in Juba or a Shokoro in Nairobi saves his dying life from the pang of hunger, he is not saved from the panga of anger according to Sharia. But when Bashir saves his hungry economy (government) by picking from the oil money of his neighbour, he is saved from the angry autonomy of the Sharia law. You see?

Declaring Fatwa Against Bashir

I hear a ‘Fatwa’ is an Islamic order pronounced against an infidel or a criminal, and is executed by any member of Islam. If this is true, then I, regardless of being a non-Muslim, hereby, in the name of the law, declare that Omar Hassan Ahmed al Bashir be tried by the Sudanese laws for stealing the Southanese money. Any practising Islamic member nation is hereby requested to arrest the suspect (Al Bashir) once he sets his foot on their soil, including South/Sudan whose oil his hand is caught red-handed in. Mr. Ocampo, at least this looks like the Rome Statue (rather ‘statute’), which is being violated by many countries, such as Kenya, which has been struggling to host Prof. Bashir to lecture them how to dodge The Hague. Alas, too late for them!

Beware of SUICIDE!

I gather that Bashir is contemplating suicide. Yes, like Col. Muamar Gaddafi, a man from Gaddatfi tribe in Libya, Bashir from Shendi tribe (Arabic students, am I right?) from northern Sudan is swearing not to surrender to the rats and cockroaches but rather to dye fighting. Fighting who? Fighting the rats and cockroaches from Darfour, Darfive, Darsix, Darseven, and upto Dar-eleven. If he could declare war on Darfur, Nuba, Blue Nile, Eastern Sudan, Opposition parties, South Sudan, Israel, America, and those who may temper to catch him for ICC, including the coward Kenya who is now kneeling down before him to forgive her, then is it not suicide? How strong is this man to fight the whole world, including its leading Super Powers?

I was choked by a coke when I read that the same Shura (Islamic paradisaical fanatics) who steer and stir the laws in Sudan had designed their passport with that in/famous page stamped: TO ALL THE COUNTRIES EXCEPT ISRAEL AND SOUTH SUDAN! I was so excited to the extent that I informed Jesus in my night prayer that He convince His Counterpart, Prophet Mohammed (PBUH), not to inject his wisdom to make Bashir change his heart and withdraw the rubber stamp. Benefits? I would be the first Juban to book a shop from the thousands of the Arabs in town. Of course, they were going to be manhandled, bundled and packed wholesale like Iddi Amin’s Indians deported from Uganda back to their country in 1972. Who would dare move with the whole shop to Juba Airport if given 24 hours to pack their airload baggage?

Un/fortunately, our soft-hearted Government of South Sudan had already intimated that those Northanese residing in clusters of threes and fours in in the management of one single stall in the name of Darfuris, the species whose skin is akin to that of the kin and kith of the Dongolawis or Bashir’s himself from the far north, be given freedom to choose citizenship as Southanese. That means they could apply to become citizens in South Sudan! That is why I even made a joke one day that our passport page, the one that corresponds with the Khartoum’s should read that one should travel without trouble: TO ALL THE COUNTRIES EXCEPT HELL!

As Bashir is implementing his law that stipulates 'to whip, cut or kill', he ordered his army to bomb Nuba Mountains village of Kurchi on June 27, 2011, an air raid that cut many Nuba children into pieces as seen with two girls mercilessly dismembered. This is what he proudly said, "“We order the armed forces to carry on its operations and not to stop until South Kordofan is purged as Abyei was purged before, and Abdel Azizi is arrested and brought to trial.”

Un/fortunately, Bashir’s errand boy, Ali Karti, a Khartoum’s foreign affairs minister, is quoted as saying they would use the 700,000 Southanese citizens in Khartoum to fight their war. Junubiin, are we there, yet? That, again, is why the Weakleaker loathes political weaklings such as the Kartis of Khartoum’s, and their boss, who is diagnosed and proven by Weakleaks to be suffering from oral diarrhea nowadays.

Yeah, Your Ex-cellency, go ahead. Recruit them. Arm them. Harm them. Send them to shoot us. And you will feel the original taste of the suicide you are naively committing to yourselves. Of course, if not a ‘foolitician’, then which political animals would allow a deportee to come along with guns in order to shoot his relatives back home?

Uncle Mayardit, bravo! Keep those taps dry untill their ass dry up (sorry for the typo error of ‘earth’). No worry, you know how we survived for over two decades of decadence in the bush while they were siphoning our oil and occupying our soil against us. For those who have just joined us from them, shut up! You do not know how to do it. Mr. Pagan is a real pagan (infidel) according to the Northanese who have already condemned and sentenced him to death penalty (fatwa) in Khartoum for his patriotic stubbornness.That is a true Southanese! Go man, go. Sing them the in/famous song I like, from Bor North (Twic) literature again:

“…abï jur ë tiɛɛl lɔ kuik ë thoŋ tök, kɔc kaa jo kuik, paantueeŋ ayan bɛ̈ny thïn! (meaning … until the bastards of jealousy had to squeeze through a single channel. Let them squeal, I am also the boss in the western wing!). Please again, no one should domesticate this quote. I just like our local literature and am using it for that logical action by our leaders. Bashir, take note!

HYPOCRISY: Beware of African dictators who deceive their people, "I will die for my country", when they actually mean "I will die WITH my country". They are politically, economically and militarily at large, in fact larger than their whole nations.

 To conclude, politically, I have presented what Presidents Bashir and Bashar mean by imposing their own laws (read wills) upon their vulnerable people, poetically, I had reported to Allah this terror caused in the name of this Shari’a law in the following way in my book, ‘The Black Christs of Africa’, Chapter Two: Letters of Reconciliation and Fetters of Conciliation.

***

Poem 25

*

In court with God’s lawyer

 *

Dear Heavenly Father,

Are You aware of deals going farther;

That a man claiming to be your lawyer,

A man famous as an acclaimed liar,

Is condemning me to hell on earth,

That I brought life out of wrong birth?

Are You aware of the Final Judgment going on here?

           *

Dear Almighty father,

Are you aware of his all mighty feather,

A crown with which he coerces the crowd,

In the name of Your Law into a fire cloud,

Of the early judgment into earthly hell,

May you please check the powers of his spell?

Are You aware of the Final Judgment going on here?

 *

Dear Holy Father,

Are you aware that he has gone further

To bring all but me to book,

While it’s clear from my book and his look,

That I blasphemed not against my God’s,

That I committed this sacrilege against his Guts,

Are You aware of the Final Judgment going on here?

 *

Contextual Quote

In any country there must be people who have to die. They are the sacrifices any nation has to make to achieve law and order.

Field Marshal Idi Amin Dada (1925? - 2003)

Uganda soldier and politician (Dictator: 1971 – 1979).

 ***

 The following is another letter from the same chapter urging and warning the South Sudanese who are still lingering behind in North Sudan. I composed this poem in reaction to the former Sudan Minister of Information’s warning, “They will not enjoy citizenship rights, jobs or benefits, they will not be allowed to buy or sell in Khartoum market and they will not be treated in hospitals,” Obeid further said in statements carried by public radio. “If the result of the referendum was separation, then the southerners will not enjoy citizenship rights in the north as they would be considered citizens of another state”,

These was announced in October 2011, and our deadhead people are still chewing Arabs’ things like gazelles chewing their curds inside a hunter’s trap. Come on folks! If you have a relative in Khartoum, copy and send this poem to them.

***

Poem 24

*

Dear Cartoons in Cart-tombs

 *

I know you do not know

That you are still in Egypt.

That’s why I invite you now

For an exodus to in masses exit.

 *

I know you do not know

That you are the wall of the great Jericho,

The human shield around that blazing snow,

In which you do not hear any external echo.

 *

I know you do not know

That the political geckos cram you into social ghettos,

In tomb-shaped structures like terraces of potatoes,

Easier for indoctrination with their Shari’a law.

 *

I know you do not know

That we have already resolved in the South,

To part way with those turbaned cartoons of the North,

Who force your women to dress like our war widow.

 *

I know you do not know

That in their class lists you fall third row,

That they make you in your homed cartons

Live like animated Cart-tomb’s cartoons.

*

 Contextual Quote

How about those people? How about those guys? How about those ones? How about those other guys I see with their heads wedged among aliens?  How will they be? Will they not have their testicles sliced off like the proverbial man who had wedged his head into the elephant’s (carcass) stomach? Better, better the elephant hunter, for he avenged himself with his sharp spear? How about you, what will you avenge yourselves with? Eh, count me out if…!           

Akutkuei Music Group. “How About Those Ones…?” (Translated from Dinka by the author).

*

Is it possible that my people live in such awful conditions?…I tell you, Mr Wheatley, that if I had to live in conditions like that I would be a revolutionary myself.

George V (1865 - 1936)

British monarch.

On being told Mr. Wheatley’s life story.

 

Our Intelligence Systems Suffering from our Negligence Symptoms

SOUTH SUDAN IN DIE-LEMMA: From the right side, the southend of the Southern nation of the war-ravaged Sudan, the bullet is being pushed in. From the left side, the northend of the Southern country of the oil-rich Sudan, the oil is being pumped in. Damn the resource curse of South Sudan!

“We listen to them. They know that we listen to them. What kind of stupidity? You know I’m listening to what you say every day, and you go on talking about salaries, ammunition, supporting us, and bringing more tanks near the borders, and the rest,” Sudan Minister Ali Karti said (to Reuters).

By what means are they listening to us? This question can even generate that quickest and simplest answer from a 7-year-old Southerner. So which of the following means is True and which is False?

a- Telephone!

b Spies

c- Internet: (Facebook!, Wikileaks, Weakleaks!)

d- None of the above

e- All of the above

How to put your answer? Use the Comments space below or the Polls attached herewith. The winning votes or comment will be broadcast on the Weakleaks! Polleaks page or on the author’s (penndengong) facebook wall or Twitter site @jonnypenny.

How is our Intelligence system suffering from our Negligence symptom?

  It is a fact undeniable that a so-called security operative uses his status to attract respect from the public. To make sure that women and other people prostrate before him, he openly broadcasts his findings or some ‘classified news’ at a joint or beer place, or even at our Tea Parliaments. After that, we would dial a number of a friend in Jonglei, Kampala or Watchington and say proudly, “I just heard from Gen. Samuel Security or Col. Ahmed Chol (all pseudonyms) that the forces are blah blah blah…aha…!” To be more specific, let me analyse the findings on the Polleaks (opinion poll) given above.

1- Telephone

In the first week of January, 2012, when I was in Kampala, my attempts to call my friend in Juba (using our independent code +211..) was met with a rude answer from that mobile service provider. In a very heavy Arabic that I thought I had dodged when I voted ‘Separation’ last year, the voice said finally in English, ‘Sorry you have dialed a wrong number or the number that is not in service…” (or something of that kind). As I was left wondering about and wandering around, a cousin advised me to use the old code (now Khartoum’s) +249…, and it went through! Juba, come on! Where is our independence now if we are still being tapped on phone by Khartoum as confessed by their foreign minister above? I thought the deadline for all mobile networks to change their codes from +249 to +211 was already dead, i.g. gone since last October. Is this not a negligence from our intelligence apparatus?

 If not that negligence, then this. “Hey, you hear our president is travelling to his village today, and he will tackle the issues of blah..blah…blah..” This is exactly what a Kenyan minister condemned us for during the funeral of the late Garang in 2005. “How can you dial a number from Thuraya phone, whose control room you know very well, and begin to broadcast aloud, ‘the Chairman is travelling by helicopter from Rumbek or Kampala today…’ and you think you are talking alone?”

2- Spies

OF RUSSIAN MAKE! This chopper was captured in the deepest village of Palouch in Jonglei/Upper Nile State as it was delivering some drugs and munitions to George Athor (RIP). It was intercepted and detained by the SPLA in 2010. Now, can you blame our forces for firing warning shots at white helicopters who happen to hover over their barracks without information or permission as it happened to Russian soldiers in Yambio last here. Was it not reported also in 2009 by UN that Bashir branded his planes with UN symbols to use in Darfur, and also claimed this chopper was used for humanitarian missions for Fashoda relief organization...?

There are too many ‘Darfuris’ in Juba, some of them with skin akin to Bashir’s own kin or even lighter than that of tribe of Ja’ali. Such species might be spies in sheep skins, who come with spices for our economy, while (we) not knowing they are spies against our autonomy. In our country, there are too many shopkeepers crammed in one shop of Arabs’ origin in the name of northern Sudanese traders, call them merchants-cum-mercenaries. No papers, no visas, no taxes, etc.

By the way, who said the whole Darfur region and their ‘coloureds’ are good dudes to the Duts and Dengs of the South? Is it not the same Darfur that is now complaining to NCP-led government for not having rewarded them for fighting a 21-year Jihad against the South? I support our Minister of Interior’s proposal of taking all those roaming and roving ‘refugees’ to where they belong, say, refugee camps. Yes, we can create here Hai Yousuf and Jabarona, etc. for the Northern IDPs (Intelligence Displaying Personnel) just the way they did it to our Southern IDPs (Intentionally Displeased Persons) who were settled in the deserts outside Khartoum in the 90s. Reasons for labelling and settling South Sudanese in camps of structures made of cardboard and donkey/camel dungs, as if they were not the same citizens of the Sudan: because they come from the South, meaning ‘Not Trusted’ security-wise!

I think we are really intelligent (Intelligent) but not deligent. If we were not such negligent, then why failed to read the world political meter of the day? I have no problems with Chinese signing the old deals for the new pipelines and petroleum-related businesses. I have no problem with Russia having its Embassy or its semblance here, but I have every problem with them refusing to take part in the UN mission (UNMISS) from whom they are paid millions of dollars. What is the real reason in this ideal season they are now pulling out of the UN Mission in South Sudan? I doubt if this, though…

“There is a likelihood that our unit will be withdrawn, Russia’s RIA Novosti news agency quoted Gatilov as saying. He said Moscow had repeatedly asked the UN Secretariat and the South Sudan authorities to take measures to ensure the Russians’ security.” (sudantribune.com). What an irony and sarcasm! So Russia in the name of UN is now condemning South Sudanese for not ensuring maximum security to their (UN) soldier who have been sent and paid to give South Sudanese security after the split of the country. What do they mean?

The Russians (why not UNMISS?) just grounded their helicopters in Juba and refuse to diffuse the semi-genocide in Jonglei state. Why? That they are not given security. Some of the fake and vague excuses included the SPLA’s shooting of their helicopter in the LRA rebel-haunted Western Equatoria last August. Well, WES Governor, Joseph Bakosoro did explain, with apology to UNMISS, the reasons for the warning shot at their straying chopper.

Actually, if I were the commander of that legion in that region over which the unannounced (but UNMISS usually informs the states of their visits) helicopter was hovering, I would shoot at it. Why? Because I have ever heard of Khartoum sending aircrafts marked ‘UN’ to spy in Darfur. I have also seen a helicopter captured at Palouch around Malakal while delivering supplies to the late Gen. George Athor. The chopper that was confiscated in that sophisticated mission in 2010 was handed over free of charge: of financial charges nor legal charges back to Khartoum last year (2011) just to appease Khartoum and their allies who manufactured and manned it. Giving them such immunity through impunity is negligence at the highest order. Yet they are not happy!

By the time I was still a cow boy in my village in 1988 (picture taken in 2008 while I was on oil baseline survey), this Russian-made MIG 23 terrorised us but fate brought it down, thanks to the SPLA. It almost crashlanded on us and our goats at Kolmarek. It was our turn to terrorize its Libyan pilot who begged us not to treat him the Gaddafi way, his Russian colleague having crashed into flames some kilometres away at Pagua, almost crushing our mothers on lalop-fetching expedition: two metalic angels just in my village! That's why I became a little SPLA soldier immediately the following year.

Last week, I heard also of the Russian pilots and other crew members released by South Sudan without charges. I gather that they were captured and detained with their air scrab (call aircraft) in such dubious missions in Sarjas, Unity State. I know of other Russian involvement dating back to the war times as seen in the picture of the MIG 23 fighter, on which I am sitting there.

There is this other reason presented by Russian government to justify their dangerous neutrality both in the Jonglei massacres as well as in Abyei and other peace-related disputes in Sudan. “According to the Kremlin website the Russian soldiers and helicopters are to withdraw from South Sudan by April 1st after “honorably” fulfilling the tasks of maintaining peace and security in the country.” Come on guys, and tell us the truth. Are you running away from insecurity or you have ‘honorably’ completed your mission of providing security to South Sudanese local population for whom you signed the contract?

Now, who does not know that all the nationalities comprising the UNMIS which was graduated into UNMISS by just adding another ‘S’ (South) were approved by President Omar al Bashir? Any country that is not friendly to Khartoum was either cancelled out of the mission or counselled into the mission. That is all. Therefore, we know the reasons why Russians refused to guard the civilians in Abyei, Jonglei, etc. the way we also know the reasons why the UN soldiers played that game in Rwanda in 1994. The moment you see them pulling out very fast in the name of insecurity, then there is something nasty coming behind.

Similarly, I am toying around with the suspicious feelings that something has gone amiss in our current security level in South/Sudan. At this most needy hour when Khartoum is in looming oil war with Juba, and the Russians running away for unclear reasons…do not be just afraid, be very afraid!

3- Media versus Security

This is Peter Ngor Garang Ariath, an editor of The Destiny newpaper whose destiny was decided by the National Security guys. They collected him with Dengdit Ayok, the author of the in/famous 'Nyanbany' article said to be critical of the wedding of the first daughter (Adut Kiir Mayar). If the whole world had not made noise, the dudes would still be in now. So they were released unconditionally but not without having our young nation permanently profiled on the world's largest website, the Wikipedia, as the newest nation whose constitution does not have 'Media Law', hence does not have freedom of expressions (reads so under democracy chapter).

On this section, I am going to write right away from my experiences. I am one of the cadres being involved in fighting this vicious war of psychology between the Media practitioners and the Security personnel. The war stems out from the fact that whereas the Security operatives believe that the media operators are threat to security, the Media believes that the Security is a threat to individual freedom. This dates back to the liberation struggle, which was primarily anchored to the communist bloc, thanks to the cold war that liberated our liberators from that ideology of seeing any journalist as a Western spy. That backgound, coupled with the brand of security-vs-media borrowed recently from Khartoum, is haunting the South Sudanese journalists of the day.

Therefore, I suffer. I first experienced first hand the siblings sort of rivalry between the Media and the Security when I was in Yei as an English tutor in the SPLA’s college known as ISS (Institute of Strategic Studies) in 2005. During the graduation of the SPLA’s senior officers in 2006, I was invited and I, of course, had to come along with my camera. As I tried to capture some happy moments of the graduands, one colonel violently whisked me away, “La, la, la! Don’t! I would rather you point me with a Kalashnikov that with that thing of yours…” That thing of mine was a camera versus a Kalashnikov or AK47, an automatic assault rifle invented by a now 92-year-old Russian Gen. Mikhail Kalashnikov in 1947. That’s why the Anya-nya 1 guys missed it! That is why they had to resort to using Molatov Cocktail. That one is a gun also invented by another general before 1947. It is your beer bottle + oil = grenade!.

Having given the reason giving rise to this level of ‘cameraphobia’ (hatred against the camera), I suffered another blow in 2008. As I took my choir (The Little Doves) to entertain H.E. President Salva Kiir and his old guards on the Veterans Day (August 18) in Juba, I had that thing. As we kicked off with our popular hit ‘Garang Addana Horriya…”, the Big Man stepped in and swayed about with us and his men. Having mingled with his children democratically, I took good shots of the rare scene. This is the beginning of the end of my stage presentation and photographing in the president-attended functions. The rest of the story is mine and David Pachong’s (my colleague). We had to take our camera from the presidential security office three days later, but not without signing an oath that Mr. Penn penned himself, “I hereby declare not to take any picture of the president illegally…” Whatever that adverb means.

Thirdly, another incidence occurred in front of the presidential advisor, in the middle of the street, in 2010. There was this popular nationalistic program dubbed ‘Keep Juba Clean’ that was initiated and executed by none other than Her Excellency, Rebecca Nyandeng de Mabior. Supported by a mob of celebrities ranging from musicians, Miss Malaikas, journalists, activists and me, the 12-week volunteering wound up on me in a bad way just a week before it was disbanded by Nairobi Fly, an insect that I suspect might have followed the Kenyans to Juba.

As I used to work with my camera in my left hand and the garbage can in my right, some ‘security personnel’ just picked me up and took me for interrogation at their headquarters along the Juba Airport-Ministry Road. The office where I was locked up for some good four hours ironically happened to be my former office of ‘The Liberator’, an SPLA magazine that I co-founded and incorporated under the department of information in the Directorate  of Moral Orientation (formerly known as PMO) in the General Headquarters — thanks to Gen. George Athor (RIP), my former boss. When Mama Rebecca was given detail of my temporary kidnapping, she intervened by calling up the authorities ‘from above’, whose orders made me a free man before 3PM.

My crime? Holding a camera that they believed I might have used for taking pictures of the convoy of military war ware (tanks and armoured trucks) that headed in the northerly direction at midday in the busiest only tarmacked road in our multi-national city of Juba. I had to reclaim and retrieve my camera three days later not because I was guilty but because I asked, “Did you know that many Arab ‘traders’ were busy taking pictures with their mobile phones and cameras in those shops lining the roads all the way from Konyo-Konyo to Customs Market? Even if I had taken your convoy pictures, what danger does that poise to our nation?”

Biel Boutrus proudly holds up for my camera the sample National ID Card belonging to H.E. Salva Kiir Mayardit just a few minute after the closing of the Independence Declaration Ceremony at Garang's Mausoleum on July 9, 2011. This document together with The African Bible, the Flash of Sudan which the President confiscated from being handed over to Presideent Bashir and many other national souvenirs that would be part of the expensive antics later in 2050 AD, were abandoned at the podium, showing the height of the negligence of our security over the property of South Sudan.

I have observed that the security guys who arrest cameramen and women do not refer to any immediate law but to the old belief that a journalist is a dangerous person, even if it means a journalists of their own army media. For example, I happened to watch a rare spectacle on the 28th day of May, 2011, in Bor, the day the Southerners (SPLA) celebrated their 28th Anniversary of the May 16 revolution. The security personnel manhandled, roughed up and arrested my former colleague, Mayom Bul Atem, just for taking pictures of the military parade. He had to be released a day later with bruises, especially when it was discovered that he was the managing editor of ‘The Liberator’, the said SPLA magazine, whose photos Mayom was taking.

The last of my media-versus-security escapades was at Nyakuron Cultural Centre. It began at the gates during one of the Awilo Longomba’s shows. A carful of ladies and three gentlemen pulled up at the gate and waved threatening at the security (correction: securico) guards to fly the gate open. When the ticket lad appeared loaded with them labelled  ’50-Pound’, the driving young boss shook his head monotonously and asked, “You mean you don’t know me?!” As the ticket guy responded, “Yes, I kow you sir as our customer tonight, and that’s why I am asking you for a ticket. If you don’t have, please here you are…” To the surprise and dissapointment of all the queue-standers, the man lashed out his national security ID card and displayed it in such a way that everyone saw it. They penetrated as the security guards prostrated!

AFTER THE KIDNAPPING AND STABBING IN 2006 AND 2007 RESPECTIVELY: The author (John Penn de Ngong) at Makerere University after surviving attacks on campus on June 7, 2007, a year after cheating death at the hands of mysterious kidnappers in Kampala, April 25, 2006. Reasons: He once wronte, "I was almost killed for just one obvious reason, the very reason they sacrificed and crucified Jesus Christ for: telling the truth; and telling it just as it is."

As they came in late (around 11PM), there was not any idle table other than ours. We were a bunch of three journalist-cum-artists who would move up and down taking pictures ones Awilo screamed out with another hit. They squarely seated their ladies on our seats besides grabbing the neighbours’ unoccupied chairs, as if to punish them for having gone to empty their bladders during such a busy show. When we came back from the shooting, they scanned us up and down, down and up, and grinned and laughed, “Who said journalists are seated at high tables?”

No sooner had we reacted with our artists’ bouncing poses than one of the organizers tugged me aside by my Tee-shirt’s very short sleeve. “Don’t you know those ones are from the office of the President? Please, leave them, we don’t want our show closed.” He appeased us with free seats but on the rails of the stage, from where we could watch Awilo changing his shirts and sipping his Johnny, the Walker, to help him walk back to the stage, or something of that kind.

Let me defend myself over condemning them here. In fact, I have no problem with them forcefully capturing our table, I have a problem with them advertizing their status, especially when we learned in another function that they were not from the president’s house or office as claimed. So many conmen in the name of security out there contribute to our Intelligence service being a victim of negligence by the public, which is supposed to cooperate in providing community policing.

Community policing should be one of the best method we should keep away the thousands of foreigners robbing and scaring away investors from our young nation. Community policing includes local chiefs fighting local thieves in their areas, including those complicated cattle raiders. The women, chiefs, local youth and children know not only the strangers in their villages but also whoever behaves in a strange way around there. So let no one declare themselves the only exclusive providers of security in South Sudan. If so done with impunity and immunity in our commmunity, it will make our intelligence systems suffer from general negligence syndromes such as explained above.

4- Internet

  It should be borne in mind that the term media is the mother of all those communications channels, including the internet, and also the ‘externet’ (don’t look up this word in your dictionary, I will define it elsewhere in another article later). The Internet includes the websites, especially the security-unfriendly website. I am talking about the Wikileaks and its sons and daughters such as ‘not my Weakleaks’ but the Facebook, the Twitter, etc. Just go around those social media sites and you will know what even Salva Kiir and his Ears and Eyes are yet to see and hear one month later. That is why I advise the security friends not to carry out their operations of hunting for bad boys online because they are the source of their intelligence.

Not only that but if you begin arresting social media practitioners, you risk contracting for your boss the Mubarak’s virus. What is it? Facebook war! Or don’t you know that the Egyption Revolution that is still going on today is called ‘The Facebook Revolution’? Where do you think they camped and recruited their fighters? On Facebook and Twitter. And when President Hosni Mubarak tried to send his boys to arrest them and shut down the internet in an attempt to kill the revolution, the Facebookers beat them in their own game. Tahrir Square was the final station whereby the ‘Twitterers and Facebookers’ would book their spaces and exchange their physical faces.

Consider this quote from my fellow Sudanese blogger, Amir Ahmad Nasr (aka Drima), on his weblog: “The recent Tunisian and Egyptian revolutions have demonstrated to the world that young Muslim freedom fighters today have something explosive in their hands. No, it’s not a bomb, stupid. It’s a computer connected to the Internet. And it has the power to help ignite an uprising, and blow apart the structures of ignorance, repression and indoctrination that too often still imprison the Muslim mind.”

5- None of the Above

If you do not agree that our Intelligence system is undermined by all those four negligence symptoms, then give me another list in the comment space at the end of this post.

6- All of the Above.

If you believe all of the above six factors (including the section No. 6 above) are symptoms of the negligence of our intelligence system, then suggest ways of improving our intelligence and security status in the baby republic of South Sudan. Don’t you do it in such a way that it jeopardizes the Republic, which means the public, but let your method be pro-people so that the African Spring does not follow the Arab Spring with South Sudan championing it.

Finally, watch out that none robs you of your basic rights and turn my best wishes to all of my readers and my leaders of a ‘Happy New Year, into those of the worst witches of the ‘Heavy New Year’, 2012!

 

Suffering from ETHNORRHOEA: Should we wear white or black on Jan. 9?

SWEET MEMORIES! At 9.09 AM on January 9, 2011, I and our liberation legend, Rtd. Gen. Joseph Lagu, (as seen in the picture) successfully tossed a ballot that decidedly made our new history whose first anniversary we are commemorating today. Given the mess with our peace today among the tribes, states of South Sudan, and borders with the orphaned Republic of Sudan, I can't dedicate this day to CPA's 7th anniversary yet.

I am a man born and grown through a series of serious dilemmas. A dilemma (I call it die-lemma) is a situation where you are forced to choose between sacrificing your mother or your father, as practised by those ruthless parasites in the name of parricides, patricides, matricides, fratricides, sororicides and infanticides of Jonglei State. What are these? These terms describe murderers of relatives, namely: parents, fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters and babies (infants) in that order.

Therefore, while celebrating (better word is commemorating) the major milestones leading to our in/dependence on January today, a group of youth to which I subscribe in principle put me at a crossroad of whether to ‘commemobrate’ (commemorating by celebrating) or mourn the arrival and/or departure of peace in South Sudan on such a day. This message seems to massage, however, not my mood of the day, though it is un/ethical to celebrate when your home state, or even your homestead, has been ( and is still) moaning and mourning till this morning. The Press Release, releaased by the Concerned Citizens X South Sudan that happened to organize the CPA-cum-Referendum anniversary event, reads thus in part: 

“The new group is calling for all peace-loving South Sudanese, and our supporters, to demonstrate their commitment to peace during this season of celebration in two simple ways:

 

-   by wearing white clothing or white armbands on CPA Day/Referendum Day, the 9th January 2012. In so doing, we hope to make the point that peace-lovers in our new nation far outnumber those who are engaged in planning or perpetrating violence among us. The aim is to make it possible for all peace-loving South Sudanese to make their voices heard in a silent, non-confrontational, cost-free and yet visible manner. The wearing of white may seem trivial. However, this action has been carefully chosen for good reasons. The colour white is identified internationally as the colour of peace. Most people, however poor, have at least one item of white clothing, or even a piece of white cloth, which they can tie around their arm as a sign of solidarity. Therefore, everybody who agrees with the message of peace is able to participate, regardless of their income.“

 

I accept, except, with a black colour. Right now, as I am writing this piece of thought for the sort of peace we are supposedly celebrating today, I am in black-and-white stripes of pajamas (just imagine the US prisoners’ uniform) in my house in Kampala. Am I celebrating? No, I am hardly celebrating; I am deliberating, contemplating and praying for the peace we have bled for to mend but are now bleeding for to bend in our virgin nation.

 

Because it is a fact well known in our current history that July 9 ushered in our independence through CPA (09/01/05 and Referendum (09/01/11), it is also a fact to be well known in our recurrent story (news) today that scores of innoncent lives wasted in Akobo County yesterday, following the over a 1,000 innocent people killed in Pibor until last week, and maybe in Bor next week! In the same vein, it is also another fact not yet well known that January 9 has permanently brought peace in South Sudan for today and tomorrow. What one cannot deny is that it has brought independence; but peace, let’s wait and see…!

 

Well, my name is John, a messenger of peace; not Amos, a prophet of doom, not Thomas, a champion of doubt. So let note not be taken in such a way that I am one of the worst wishers of the baby nation. What I strongly believe, and want you to do so, too, in order to relieve ourselves from procrastination, is (according to one of my poems): the tomorrow of yesterday is today and the yesterday of tomorrow is still today, so why do we mind less about the occurring programmes, which bring solutions to our recurring problems? So, let’s neither celebrate nor commemorate on January 9, let’s contemplate peace.

Yes, my worry is that as Jubans are spread white in turbans or lawa in full bloom for peace, Jongleyans are clustered black in rugs and rags in full gloom of war. So why..and what should I wear and where should I go today? To listen to the voice of wisdom, Okot P’bitek once said in a saying akin to Luo folks, ‘Don’t uproot a pumpkin from an old homestead.’ So I choose this: Ecclesiastes 7: 1 – 6 (OT),

  1- A good name is better than fine perfume,

"This is unethical to put such a picture on a blog like this!" protests my ready reader who is going to visit Weakleaks! and read this post. But is it more unethical than to kill a person and convert them into this form?

and the day of death better than the day of birth.

2- It is better to go to a house of mourning

than to go to a house of feasting,

for death is the destiny of every man;

the living should take this to heart.

3- Sorrow is better than laughter,

because a sad face is good for the heart.

4- The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning,

but the heart of fools is in the house of pleasure.

5- It is better to heed a wise man’s rebuke

than to listen to the song of fools.

6- Like the crackling of thorns under the pot,

so is the laughter of fools.

This too is meaningless.

Jonglei, the House of Mourning

Therefore, as my family is in Kampala, my body is in Juba, my heart is in Bor, my soul in Pibor and my spirit in Akobo, the great Tribal Triangle of Conflict in Jonglei State.

Jonglei State, the largest of the 10 states of South Sudan, comprising 11 counties, 18 Payams and 88 bomas, has been the epicentre of the Sudan Civil War since 1983. It is the state that released the first bullet that ignited the over two-decade war that gave rise to those decades of decadence, including this one, and it is again the one that is still releasing the last bullets despite the attainment of the objectives the guns were imported for – South Sudanese Independence in the name of the Republic of South Sudan. It’s therefore our moral duty as Jongleyans to pierce together our fierce communities where peace is kept in pieces and unity in units.

By the way, who is milking or sucking that cow alone? Could it be the cause of the conflict that a certain clique of colleagues are suckling from the Jonglei cow's udder at the expense of the poor Jongleyans' roads, hospitals, schools, telephones...?

The Outbreak of ETHNORRH`EA!

Wherever we are celebrating, commemorating or contemplating this day of our achievement, we must remember that there is no enough liberation, no enough liberty and no dependent independence in South Sudan as long as we are still dominating the headlines of the news of the world with negative development. We took up arms in order to free our common people, not just our common cities, from suffering, misery and death, which are a result of PID (Poverty, Ignorance and Death).

Therefore, as the rest of Africa are struggle with the menace of epidemics of diarrhoea or gonorrhea, and/or their complicated forms (cholera and AIDS), our populace is laced with the outbreak of tribal diarrhoea in the name of ethnic massacres. This, I call ETHNORRHEA, a result of ethnic diarrhoea. To make it even worse, it is no longer in form of a di-rrhoea (two) but of a ‘tri-rrhoea’. It has hit South Sudan in its entirety and Jonglei as an entity, three times over the last two fortnights: Massacres in Bor (e.g. Jalle and Duk), Pibor (all over) and Akobo (yesterday) in that revenge cycle.

Finally, allow me, before I pen off here, to define a bit about the origin of this ’ethnorrhoea’ (genocidal epidemic of ethnic riots) in our state(s) from the extract of the abstract of the research I wrote in May last year.

PROBLEM STATEMENT

The Jonglei State’s diverse ethnic and geographical background is supposed to be a blessing but is now turned into a curse. The curse meanders in the communities in a triangle of tribalism/ethnocentrism, conflict and then underdevelopment/poverty.

1- Ethnocentrism

Ethnocentrism is an assumption by an ethnic group (tribe) of superiority over the rests. This is backed up by our African traditional history and contemporary politics of numbers and tribal loyalties with politicized economic royalties. Parochial ethnicity breeds contempt of one ethnic group over the other. This results into tribal frictions, intolerance and eventually violence, the situation more widely believed (as seen by the peace caravan group from the speeches, expressions and references) to be fuelling the conflict in Jonglei.

To complete the whole picture of the cause and the course of this perennial conflict, read my whole analysis in a report on our Gunpi-peace blog: http://gunpipeace.wordpress.com/,

Or download and keep on your shelf for your self this 36-page PDF booklet on the Jonglei Conflict Assessment on my blog link here: http://weakleak.files.wordpress.com/2011/06/peace-assessment-report.pdf

This cover design of the report details the conflict cycle in Jonglei.

Lastly, as I say wish you a happy new year in Juba (which sounds like Heavy New Year in PiBor and AkoBor), see my prediction of the whole situation in South Sudan as I wrote it in a summary of the war on January 9, 2007, by the time I thought the war had gone for that wrong reason that I could only tell in this right season (from my ’The Black Christs of Africa’ poetry book’s chapter 5, entitled “The Horror of Terror in the Era of Error): 

*

Poem 62

*

The Summary of the War

                   In the aftermath of our war-peace euphoria,                   

                   Sudan is reduced into a vast village of sudatoria,

                   Where conflict convalescents await their fate in sanatoria,

                   As Doctors vendor words of war in wards of war or auditoria.

Lifespan is equated to a quarter in Eastern Equatoria.

The epicentre of conflict lies in Central Equatoria,

And war has wasted Western Equatoria,

                    And worn out Western Bahr-el-Ghazal.

                    Death is nursed in Northern Bahr-el-Ghazal.

                    Warrap State is a war-rapped estate.

                    It is lakes of tears in the Lakes State.

Wells of blood swell wells of oil in the Unity State.

It’s all up and down, upside-down in Upper Nile state,

And tons of skeletons jangle in the jungles of Jonglei State.

                   Grave mounts outnumber the Nuba Mountains.

                   It blew up into blue night in the Blue Nile.

                   Abyei, an abyss of abuse!

                   Darfur: impossible to dare for!

 *

Relevant Quote

Sudan became just another example of a resource-rich country torn by war and mass poverty—another case of ‘natural resource curse’ (Stiglitz 2006). The ‘resource curse’ cannot be eliminated without a development process that combines growth with equity and quality of life and without the appropriate structures to govern the development process. This is more easily said than done in the case of Sudan.

N. Shanmugaratnam

Post-war Development and the Land Questions in South Sudan

Norwegian University of Life Sciences (UMB)  

*

As for those tribal vigilantes and political marauders that pillage our villages in Jonglei and South Sudan, the book tells this about them in a poem dedicated to the LRA bandits that terrorized us when I was their raw material (a student in Northern Uganda).

*

Poem 33

*

To Whom It May Concern

              

Here reads the confession

Out of voluntary conversion,

Pinned up for every over-rover

By a lonely homing hover-over.

 *

Watch out!

Of human weeds,

Pests, parasites…

Ogres,  ghouls, ghosts;

 *

They take cannabis

And turn into cannibals.

They inhale herbs and heroin,

And boast like a hero and heroine.

 *

They are out of the noose,

They are on the loose,

At large at random

To prey on our freedom.

 *

Fathers, keep a distance from fatherless patricides.

Mothers, there roam your merciless matricides.

Parents, avoid these parasitic parricides.

 *

Keep out of reach of children the infertile infanticides,

Hey, my brothers, mind your moves: furious fratricides!

Sisters, I saw you on the rape list of sorrowful sororicides!

 *

To all families; keep indoors from homing homicides,

For they fake martyrdom in the name of suicides,

My community, keep an extra eye on genocides.

 *

Students, leave not campuses to meet your studicides.

Traders, you’re easy prey to marauding businicides,

And refugees should be saved from refugicides.

 *

Leaders, you are prone to regicides.

Let the citizens guard against silly citicides,

And the nation close its doors to ethnocides.

 *

The churches to fast and curse their clericides

The villagers to dodge and lodge not their villigicides,

All in all, save our economy from conning economicides.

 *

Relevant Quote

The only defence is in offence, which means that you have to kill more women and children more quickly than the enemy if you want to save yourselves.

Stanley Baldwin (1867 - 1947), British prime minister. Hansard, Speech

  *

Poem 50

*

The Black Cries of Africa

 *

Twenty years of tears gone,

I visit my home town,

A ghost town torn

By war storm;

 *

My vile village,

Popular for wattle villas,

 Populated vainly by mild villeins,

Hunted and haunted by wild villains.

 *

Who are they?

Eastern merchants?

Western missionaries?

Or northern mercenaries?

 *

Or the Anya-nya?

The  Maji-Maji?

The Mau-Mau?

The Mai-Mai?

 *

The Janja-Weeds?

The Tong-Tongs?

The Kamajos?

The Ninjas?

 *

The African black cries,

Not brought from the White lands

But brewed from the White hands,

Who do pretend to organize but agonize;

 *

The black crises,

Based on crusades for Christ,

Movements for Mohammed,

Appeasements for outdated deities.

 *

The black crises of Africa

Caused by vermin

And by famine:

All by fame.

*

 Relevant Quote

The question tonight, as I understand it, is “The Negro Revolt, and Where Do We Go From Here?” or “What Next?” In my little humble way of understanding it, it points toward either the ballot or the bullet.

Malcolm X (1925 - 1965)

U.S. African American activist.

Comment

                                      

 

 

2011 in Review: 2012 in Preview

Dear Readers,

Welcome to 2012!

This is Emmy Penny. The boy entertained me with kid's frank pranks and those boyish actions you could just imagine during this festive fortnight I have been with them. e.g. He asked, "My friend (he doesn't call me Daddy), whatish Chrishmash?"

The year 2011 was odd whereas the year 2012 is even. That means that the odd histories of the old year will translate to even stories of the new year. This, therefore, confirms that history is cyclical, it replicates as it complicates along. Now that we are sure that what goes around also comes around and what comes around also goes around, let’s then thank the Lord and remain prepared…

However, I failed to answer my son’s question. After getting fed up with TV and friends’ monotonous phrases of ‘Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, etc.’, he asked in his kiddish accent, “My friend (the way we address each other), whatish Christmash?” I pass this question on to you. What is all about this wasteful and wishful event? To answer it, I failed, so I pass it onto the earlier article in which I called for its postponement in principle. http://weakleak.wordpress.com/2011/12/22/five-reasons-i-forgot-my-birthday-and-thought-and-sought-to-have-this-xmas-postponed/

Thank you very very much for keeping me aflame online. I mean if you were not reading, I would not be writing. As I concluded the year, my son clapped for me a ‘Happy-New-Year-to-You’ congratulations. He was happy for the services I gave him the whole year round, that includes a new suit. Similarly, I relay to you his message on my behalf because you have kept me updated and updating throughout the unique year, 2011. In the same vein, I must thank my weblog host, the WordPress. Please, take your time and go through your long journey in this short blog review you have been trekking since 2010 through last year. This is a very brief summary with attractive design, pomp and colour of a fireworks setting. (As per the title, I am still preparing a comprehensive review/preview for you, to be published soon).

Enjoy!

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2011 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Syndey Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 11,000 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 4 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

 

Five Reasons I forgot my Birthday and Thought and Sought to have this Xmas postponed…!

‘The day you die is better than the day you are born,” says King Solomon, Ecclesiastes 7:7; and “It is better to go to the home where there is a funeral than to that where there is a party”. I strongly dis/agree with this biblical wisdom (especially the first quote), for this and other reasons.

One, does anyone know how many people, including the BBC and our very dear SSTV, gathered and talked about Athor Deng’s day of birth? Does every one not know his death day now better than his birthday? So I agree with the wisdom but do not agree with its applicability, say, the insinuated context to join that kingdom raw in the pretext of the death day – and not the birthday – being the best day.

By the way, allow me (tongue in cheek) to tell you how many buddies turned up for my birthday today. Only 24, and the venue was only one: on the wall of my Facebook! Thanks buddies for not being busy bodies who blow away their hard-earned cash and valuable time on dancing imaginary days not known even by the ones who pushed us to this world. In advance, Merry Christ’s Mass to all the Maries, including those whose both birthdays and deathdays have been celebrated already. Rest in peace, not in pieces this time.

“Is that a birthday? Ooh no! I’d rather call it a funeral of the former year that’s if you wouldn’t mind…live long bro so that mourners lyk me mourn the more as those who call birthday celebrate…wish u well!” said one of my visitors (reminders) on my electronic wall. Thanks Mawut Reec-athooc, and all those who turned up for my birthday when I was elsewhere facing the world behind my walll of Facebook.

Apologies: Please accept my apologies here.  I was just reminded today by my well-wishers who said or wrote: Happy Birthday…! One friend from Kibakiland (Railand, Inshallah later!) called me and said Happy Birthday to you John. First I kept my silence, for a while, and went wild but with a mild smile for a mile. “Sorry,  I postponed it…I mean, I will call you back.” And with shame, I also postponed to call back my committed Facebook friend, Marie-Alek-Sanyu. Mary Christmas to you Marie.

Secondly and most importantly, I apologize to Emma J. Chris, whose best day, christened Christmas (Christ’s Mass) was promised to be postponed by somebody whose life was postponed just a day, but two, ahead. Therefore, it is my prayer that Juba (especially Salva Kiir) celebrates this Xmas without the sheer fear of the Khartoum-dubed propagandists.

This is why I thought and sought to postpone this Xmas: Others think it is a Cross-mas, so they want to nail people on a wrong cross. Others suppose it is a Krest-mas, so they only want to over-drink and over-eat and over-react, the rest just believe the way you and I think Christmas is...a Christ Mass (His Birthday).

However, my apology borders the one of last year, but on a different ground, altogether.

PRAYERFUL Apology:

Your Excellency, Emma J. Christ, Undersecretary of the Republic of the Universe, please, forgive us this blasphemy. But we are hereby requesting your heavenly authority that you speed up for us the remaining two weeks, including skipping your Birthday (today), mine (I did yesterday) and the Jallaba’s (1-1-11), just for the sake of our freedom, including that of worship, which Bashir has replaced — and still wants to replace – with freedom of warship. And if you insist that Christmas is a Christ Must, hence Sacrosant and Sacred, then please allow me shut down my PC now and head for a trip to celebrate it with Emma Jr. in Kabakaland (Kampala), BUT ON CONDITION THAT YOU JOIN US ON JANUARY 9! AMEN?

So why did I forget…? Correction: So why did I postponed my birthday?

 

CHOOSE THE BEST REASON OF THIS SEASON

1- It is no longer this…because it got expired before he turned our Christ mass into a Christ mess. “We will ensure this month that Salva Kiir will not celebrate Christmas in peace,” claims Bapiny on behalf of his boss, George Athor, on December 15. Four days later, Salva Kiir ensures that week that George Athor celebrates Christmess in pieces. So what is it?

2- Pocketlessness! Never ever think I am a liar when you meet me next time well pocketed everywhere on my outfits. To be honest, I do have them severally, but damn them: those shallow pockets that keep yawning for promises from hollow dockets (the day-to-day to-do lists) that yields nothing. This disease selectively seems to hit (why only) me harder every other day? I mean me, Penn and my penniless fellows. I summed it up in this poem that I penned three years ago but could not get published due to the same dis-ease. I will publish ‘The Black Christs of Africa’ one day when I get rich, Inshallah! Yes, by the time those who are ‘hummering’ our economy have driven their hummers from our economy and dropped their hammers from our autonomy. The descriptive comparison goes:

**

Poem 161

**

Broke and broken!

**

A black bloke,

From the Haves Clan,

Braked suddenly beside me,

Just to grin at me green,

How are you bro?

*

I’m broke,

Retorted I,

Broken bloke,

From the Have-nots Clan,

Cursed his hypocritical word ‘bro’.

“What is that term ‘broke’?”

The Have asked the Have-not.

Lucky you who is never broke.

Let me define as I feel it:

A broke bloke

Is one with too much month

By the end of the money,

Whereas a loaded lord

Is one with too much money

By the end of the month.

Oh my! I’m not only broke,

Oh my God, I am also broken!

*

2- Daylight Robbery of South Sudanese. One of the reasons I postponed my birthday is a phone call from my buddy, Emma Penn de Ngong. The boy has already had his tongued programmed — thank God — enough to speak out some invitation for his birthday, together with that of his senior Namesake. As  I rushed around amidst Athor’s deathday news, I gathered something enough for my trip. The trip was tripled! By who against whom? By bus owners against travelers. This means we: me and other South Sudanese! Believe you me. The ticket from Juba to Kampala jumped from 50 SSP ($20) in June to 300 SSP (under $100), and somewhere above $100 from Kampala to Juba! This excludes visas. And you think I would only think and seek to have my birthday party postponed alone? That’s why I called for the postponement of Christmas. And even yours, Amen?

Don’t you dare ask ‘by whom?’ I trust Their Excellencies’ speed and addiction with postponement of big days. If they could postpone their one of their national BDs (May 16th), then who am I and Jesus not to have ours chopped or pushed, especially with such heavy excuses. Don’t either resort to saying ‘Blasphemy!’. That department of price control has slept too much to my temptation and damnation at the mercy of some Ugakenyans and their likes, not sparing the Southdanese who have sold our nation away at peanut share of 5% or 10%. To who? To those who come to South Sudan with nothing and go back with somehting! They are economic fishermen. They go out with nets and come home with fish. Woe to the river that gains nothing by giving something.

4- None of the above…

5- All of the above…

*

Poem 162

*

Very Loanly

*

Alone,

I’m left

with loan.

I am bereft.

I’m very lonely

On a ticking debt

Marked ‘untill dead’.

I am in an abysmal depth

Of debts spiraling into death.

*

163

*

Arrested!

*

I am in shackles,

My house is in shambles.

Of this earth I can’t move an inch,

I am in undefined pain of a pinch,

Of a hereditary infirmity,

A localized calamity,

Framed on me alone.

I can’t even dare a loan,

For lack of collateral security.

My child a victim of food insecurity.

I am in a property island,

In prison with freedom on my motherland,

With none to bail me out.

The whole nation is moving about

In search and display of their wealth.

I beg and dig just to buy a wreathe

For my old man who to poor health succumbed.

This son of man is to blame for all this curse,

For he chose or was chosen for a cattle course.

Don’t ask me why my head is uncombed,

For combing is but for the free heads of the rich,

Who impoverish me for them to flourish.

They know my head only a tool for carrying firewood,

For that is my career imposed upon me from childhood.

O you I curse, have me bailed, god of poverty!

O You I beseech, offload me, God of property,

For not only am I such broke, I am also broken.

But to anybody nothing I spoke, expecting a token.

‘Tis You only, and if You upon my crimes harden,

Then who will unto my cries harken?

*

Instead of giving the newborn baby (i.e. BABY-NATION or RSS) real birthday gifts, they, our modern Herods, give Him surreal deathday gifts!

Above all, let note not be taken in such a way that I am seemed desperate enough (an idiot) to be calling for the postponement of my Saviour’s Birthday. I am calling for the postponement of all those activities attached to the Big Day, or any of the financial moles that bore thousands of holes in our pockets. So that we remain focused: no drinks, no bling-blings, no nonsense. That is why even my own birth day has passed unnoticed, you see! I regret it. It pains. It nags. I’ve lost it. I just have problem with any so-called Big Day now, especially after postponing mine, except the Jesus’s. I mean the spiritual fasting, not the ritual feasting of Christ Mass’ Day. To hell with them all. Let them pass into the past, very fast. I just want to say Happy New Year while we are happy near here.

Otherwise, why only on Christmas that they shoot up prices of basic commodities in our communities? Why not raise prices also on Mohammedimas? In other words and in other worlds, Ramadhan is a period where self-denial is imposed with spirituality, even to those who do not subscribe to that religion. They cut down prices by forces, including closing restaurants, bars, etc. to in/directly save. Come Christmas, the very people (like our Khartoum merchanaries…Correction… Merchants) unanimously shoot prices up at will. That is why I snatched by with anger my 3 SSP which a Ugandan woman almost took in exchange for one apple fruit. If an apple, which costs approx. 50 piastres on Kampala street can have its priced increased by 500% in Juba, just Imagine how much they sell their Adam’s Apple during this Xmas!

Somebody, please educate these looters. Have they not heard that Jesus was born on a stable? And by the STABLE, it should not be me to make you think it is a maternity with the state-of-the-art modernity. Ironically, a sty or a stable (donkeys’ dining hall) is not a stable house with a table laid with staple food, chairs, etc. There were neither cheers of the ‘Happy Birthday to You’ that time. Herod was on his Neck! Could he be on mine?! Watch yours, too, and let’s watch out before they wash us out with their fire of anger!

*

Poem 28

*

                                                            Merry Christmess!

 *

 I,I,I

this

Xmas

am thus

at this end

glad to spend

not, but to send

You this fruity tree;

I am sending for free,

In the name of The Big Three.

Reminder: this is called Christmas,

Be very careful lest you call it Christmess!

As others go to church, others go to maze or mess.

Get set for a holy mass on the birthday of Jesus Christ.

Whoever shall use or misuse it will in a big way be surprised!

Come such is a big day by which you will in any way be recognized.

In other words, I insist, not by Christmess you enter my feathery heart.

In other worlds, I intercede that by Christmas you enter my Fatherly Hut,

But not without prior warning lest on an opaque mind thou shall be hurt!

This is the season in which every creation puts their neck in the noose;

when from the year’s toil trying to snooze

Or from the year’s spoil trying to booze.

But the magi will think of a special gift;

Then, of their age, a balance of the shift.

Oh, the world is rocking us by age adrift!

To my dear Christlets, I wish you a very Merry Christmas.

To my busybodies, I wish you all a very cheery Chris’ mass.

To my boozy buddies, I wish you all a very cherry Christmess.

Alas! And of course, for your souvenir, it’s just happing near here.

At last, to all of you – brethrens in the Lord, Amen – a very Happy New Year,

With a permanent firmament over a firm foundation that henceforth shall never shear!

 *

Relevant Quote

It was deemed a disgrace not to get drunk at Christmas; and he was regarded as lazy indeed, who had not provided himself with the necessary means, during the year, to get whiskey enough to last him through Christmas.

Frederick Douglass (1817? - 1895), U.S. abolitionist, writer, and orator. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave

 

George Athor (RIP: RUST IN PIECES or Rest in Peace? ), How he was killed, and Why we should/n’t mourn or moan for him!

Mass Grave of Athor's February victims in Fangak. He claims his mission is "To unite the people of South Sudan and work against bad governance, sectarianism, insecurity..."

It is a fact undeniable that Gen. George Athor Deng killed is my uncle. It is also a fact undeniable that Gen. George Athor Deng killed my uncle. So should I/U mourn him in sorrow or just moan for him in sadism, as we continue?  This is a dilemma to many, but to me, it is not.

I am not a drunkard but I love the Pilsner Lager’s motto: IT IS GOT WHAT YOU WANT! This means the old adage: ‘as you lay your bed, so must you lie on it’. So when you drink blood of others, what will others do? As you dug their grave, so will they dig yours. This poetic justice has just happened to Gen. George Athor Deng.

In our African tradition, one would be labelled ‘witch’ if one smiles at the funeral of a dead person, even if that one was an enemy of the people, leave alone a relative. But against that odd, I hate George Athor and wished him death for the following reasons (and you?):

1- He allowed himself back to Khartoum and be used by the Jallaba to reverse what he has been fighting them for after 22 years.

2- He killed innocent mothers, children and fathers instead of Kuol Manyang and Gier Chuang, his sworn enemies.

3- George Athor advanced fake objectives and demanded foolish conditions for his peace talks.

4- The Late Athor Deng refused an amnesty as a gift from the new Republic even to those who get disappointed at the eleventh hour like Athor and Gatdet who just went back for a date with Khartoum in a Jetlink and returned to Juba in a Jetlink aeroplane.

5- George Athor lied that he was fighting, killing innocent civilians, because of Salva Kiir’s government corruption.

Gen. George Athor was killed while travelling from Rwanda through Uganda or DR. Congo to recruit in Equatoria, according to VP Dr. Riek Machar...???

Yet he was one of the generals who plundered our new nation. As the security budget is the highest in our National Budget, George benefitted from that and escaped with millions of SDGs. This includes my salaries as I was a founding editor of The Liberator (SPLA Magazine) under him when he was the Deputy Chief of General Staff for Moral Orientation (MO Directorate: SPLA GHQRs). So what corruption is he taking us back to Khartoum for?

6- Like Joseph Kony of the LRA, George Athor started a rebellion in his homestead and home state, and massacred his own relatives who do not understand the cause of his rebellion at the onset of our long-sought after Independence!

Click this link after completing this post to understand his first objectives before they were refined and united with other militias malicious groups. http://weakleak.wordpress.com/2011/03/07/south-sudan-national-resistance-movement-ssnrm/

All these, plus what you know and loathe about him, should not make us mourn him. His life is not equivalent to the ones of the thousands he has killed in a useless rebellion.

PUZZLE: Has anybody wondered why two rebellions are now crushed in the so-called Greater Equatoria Region? A distance between Morobo (if that is the true battlefield) is less than 100 kilometres from where Peter Abderahaman Sule was captured. Could it be the same rebellion he was going to host? Was Athor intending to capture Juba? How did he move from Jonglei/Northern Sudan to Rwanda through Uganda and Congo? Could there be some deals involved here and there?

Gen. George Athor who was killed near Uganda-Congo border on his way from Rwanda to recruit more soldiers from Equatoria Region!!!????

With the political prostitution going on between Khartoum and other African dictators and their countries, especially our East African neighbours that we are being enticed to join, be afraid, be very afraid! Was it not Rwanda that campaigned last month to admit Khartoum to EAC members, endorsed by Kenya and Burundi? Thanks to Uganda and Tanzania for humiliating Bashir and his dollar-stuffed stooges. Were they not the same leaders who declared and designated last week in Kampala in their so-called International Conference of the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR) the main Darfur freedom fighers (JEM & SLM) as anti-peace rebels (like LRA) and recommended and signed that they be fought off on behalf of Khartoum? I smell a rat in EAC here!.

Two days before his death, some rebel officers claimed he survived an assassination attempt in the SDA church in Pigi. Who says he prays? And in case he does, then to Whom? For whom? It is exactly like Joseph Kony of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) who pretends to rule with the Decalogue as his constitution. The Decalogue is a book of the Ten Commandments, which he all breaks. What an irony in tyranny?

Should somebody mourn the death of Kim Jong Il of North Korea? For me, I am not concerned but I am also concerned. Concerned because he permeates evil and permits the devil like Athor. Why do you think former US President George Bush referred to him and his North Korea as the Axis of Evil? Were you not bothered by his ideals of WMD and his deals with Khartoum, that supports Athor? Good ridden, they died the same day!

For me and my family, including the orphans of Jalle Massacre, Fangak Massacre, Akobo Massacre, etc. will mourn him with one eye and celebrate with another. I am going to attend his funeral service in his house in Juba and shed one line of bitter tears from the left eye and then one rivulet of sweeter tears from my right eye. Will you?

PRESS RELEASE BY DR. RIEK MACHAR IN JUBA ON DECEMBER 20, 2011 (Gurton.net)

JUBA, Decemeber 20, 2011: The announcement of the death of Rebel Leader Gen. George Athor VP Dr. Riek Machar, flanked by Info Minister, Dr. Marial Benjamin, in a press conference in Juba announcing the death of Gen. George. Speaking to the press just this morning, Dr. Riek Machar, Vice President of South Sudan, said in a press conference, “On December 19th, 2011 an SPLA Border Patrol at Morobo County of Central Equatoria State clashed with elements that were in company of Lt. Gen. George Athor. This took place around 1800 Hours. George Athor and one other soldier were killed instantly.” He explained that, “George Athor had infiltrated to the South Sudan borders, coming from Rwanda and driving through Eastern borders of Democratic Republic of Congo, DRC and Uganda. He was in a drive to recruit in Central Equatoria. His body will be handed over to his relatives for burial.” “I appeal to all the followers of George Athor to heed to the amnesty and pardon declared by the President of the Republic on 9th July 2011. I also want to reiterate the commitment of the government to the Agreement reached between George Athor Forces/South Sudan Democratic Movement and the Government of the Republic of South Sudan on 19th November 2011,” Machar said. “I call on all who rebelled against the government to lay down their arms and join the process of peace and development,” added the Vice President.

According to BBC, a spokesman for Mr Athor’s rebel group said he had spoken to his leader on Monday, but had not been able to reach him since then. He said it was possible Mr Athor had been in Rwanda for medical treatment, but he had no idea if he had been killed, or what he could have been doing in the area in which he reportedly lost his life. (This, I think, balances the story!)

This poem from my book, The Black Christs of Africa, fulfills George Athor’s situation right now, and acts as a warning to those who are still lingering behind his corpse and swearing to revenge, not on the SPLA soldiers but on their mothers.

***

Poem 41

*

They are crostitutes!

*

From south to north,

From east to west,

*

From south-east to north-west,

From north-east to south-west,

*

They do cross,

And crisscross,

*

Confusing us between here and there,

Confusing them between there and here,

*

Between north and south,

Between east and west.

*

With this rate of political prostitution

By means of geopolitical crostitution,

*

They are not prostitutes,

They are hot crostitutes!

  **

Relevant Quote

Whoever wishes to avoid becoming dizzy must try to find out the swing’s law of motion. We seem to be faced with a pendulum movement in history, swinging from absolutism to democracy, from democracy back to absolute dictatorship. Arthur Koestler, Darkness at  Noon.

 **

Poem 20

*

The Trouble Permit

*

To Whom it May Concern…

The Late Gen. Gatluak Gai, one of the South Sudanese Commanders-in-Thief and crostitutes who became dizzy and fell off the pendulum swing of the revolution

*

This is to certify

That the Sultan of Militialand,

And all his men of valour,

*

Have been issued with this permit,

To pass through any territory

Without delay or hindrance.

*

They have also been armed

With all types of guns and ammos,

To shield off any aggression,

While executing their mission.

*

Any reinforcement offered to them,

Shall not be interfered with.

And if done so, it shall be regrettable.

This orders come From Above.

*

Designed and Signed by

General Doubletrouble,

C-in-C of the Sultanate Armed Forces (SAF).

*

Relevant Quote

When a King has Dethron’d himself and put himself in a state of War with his People, what shall hinder them from prosecuting him who is no King?

John Locke (1632 - 1704) English philosopher. Second Treatise on Civil Government

**

Poem 21

*

Chiefdom of Militialand against Kingdom of Civiland

*

To H.E. Gen. Dr. Al Hajj,

Protector-General of the Chiefdom of Militialand.

*

Your Ex-cellency,

*

RE: AGGRESSION BY YOUR COMMANDER-IN-THIEF

*

With due honour,

We hereby write to you

Condemning the horror

Your installed Commander-in-Thief

Of the Armed Forces of the Chiefdom of Militialand

Is unleashing on the people of the Kingdom of Civiland.

We have the names of the commanders of mischief,

And the atrocities thereof, sent in vain to US, UN, EU and AU.

*

Your Ex-cellency, mind you,

This letter is the last in our series of complaint,

And this marks the beginning of the end of warning,

Not forgetting the news that our forces are warming,

Warming up against any proxy war with zero restraint.

However, for Your Ex-cellency’s info, this isn’t that time

You used your Commander-in-Thief to administer a dime,

To partition our nation into Chiefdom of Militialand against Civiland.

*

Finally, restrain your marauding stooges

Gen. Peter Gate-date (Gatdet) Yak who defected to and fro between SPLA and SAF 11 times made his last trip after Independence after he defected by Jetlink and returned by Jetlink airlines.

Before they undergo the wrath of this Land in stages.

*

From Commander-in-Chief,

The Armed Salvation of  the Kingdom of Civilland.

Cc. General Doubletrouble,

C-in-C of the Sultanate Armed Forces.

**

Relevant Quote

The great battleground for the defense and expansion of freedom today is the whole southern half of the globe…Their revolution is the greatest in human history. They seek an end to injustice, tyranny, and exploitation. More than an end, they seek a beginning.

John Fitzgerald Kennedy (1917 - 1963) U.S. president. Supplementary State of the Union Address

 

Just Recovering from Salva II’s WALK-TO-WORK or WALK-FROM-WORK Decree in Juba!

 

WE RUSH THEM INTO POWER, THEY CRUSH US INTO POWDER: This exactly is how power and politics corrupt our leaders. YOU GIVE THEM YOUR FULL VOTES, THEY GIVE YOU THEIR EMPTY VOICE, OR NONE AT ALL! Ok, let there be elections again...(Extract from my book of poetry, "Jongley Jongleur, & 100 Pennets' (yet to be published).

No sooner had I just reached my house exhausted than booted my PC and began to type. “I am damn tired, have walked 5 kilometres from Nyakuron Cultural Centre to Souk Jebbel, just because somebody (other than me) has decided to let me walk from work at night, after having walked to work today.” Before I add why, I saw the below post on my cobro’s (cousin brother’s) Facebook wall, and thought it would make this Weakleaker compliment the solidarity I most yearn and must always yearn from my readers, especially on stories of public interests that are likely to give us  the Ngor’s Syndrome. 

“People are dying in Jonglei and Unity States and here the government has deployed over 1,000 policemen/women to chase after boda bodas!…..Are boda bodas more important then human lives being lost in our states?”, asked Humble Anyang Ngong on a Facebook page.

I think somebody is trying to campaign against Gen. Salva Kiir and the SPLM in advance (before 2014) in South Sudan here. That ‘somebody’ is not Anyang or Ngong or Dengdit, or Ngor or Nhial Bol… It is he who just thinks the old bush style and imposes their thoughts over the people in town. As our President Salva Kiir is busy telling the Americans, Europeans and Asians in Washington DC that we South Sudanese are ready to barter our rule of law with their (donors) aid, somebody in the name of his Uncle and namesake, Salva Mathok Gengdit, is busy imposing on us the ‘law of rule’ back home (Juba). So when Salva Kiir is busy promising the world a rule of law, Gen. Salva Mathok, Deputy Minister of Interior, is busy implementing the law of rule on the poorest and more desperate section of our battered economy, the cyclists!

“Today 16/12/2011 we hereby reinforced police with more Orders, any motorcycles found entering prohibited streets in Juba Town must be seized and owner face the court to get fine,” said the orders by the Deputy Minister (quoted verbatim from his Decree).  Tongue in cheek, my/our interests as members of public that use the boda boda transport cannot wait to see the map of the “Prohibited Streets in Juba Town”. Prohibited against who? Wow, am smelling Johannesburg of 1980 here!

This is what I call the ‘law of rule’ and not the rule of law that we fought for. A rule of law is one proposed, accepted and implemented by the people, for the people and of the people. However, this is not the case. My own presentation of the opposite (law of rule) is rule coined up by a people (reads person/s or ethnic clique of colleagues in power), of a people or for a people.

What is ‘the law of the rule’ vis-a-vis the ‘rule of the law’? Apologies: I have no definite definition here but just to let the reader benefit from the reverse of our governance system from law to rule. To pretend to be simpler and clearer, a democratic law is made by the peoples’ representatives, the parliament, or electees, whereas a rule (call it Dec(g)ree the Juba way) is made by the appointees. The latter, this Draconian Decree (unresearched unilateral law) is what I refer to as the law of the rule, a law proposed and imposed by a ruler.

Look at the raw law again. “The government institution should use Honda or Yamaha Motor Bikes (thumb up to these two companies!!!..???) for their dispatch riders and plate numbers issued by National Traffic Police,” reads the Decree in part. In normal circumstances, this stinks of corruption. The public, especially companies who have imported other brands of motorbikes, will jump up with accusing finger pointing at the two companies for allegedly bribing the government into declaring them ’monopolists’. Does the Deputy Minister know the impact of his words in these economy?

This is the reason why I (they) reverse the order from the rule of law to the law of rule. In Uganda, a walk-to-work decree is declared and implemented by the marginalized people in protest against the government, while in South Sudan, a walk-to-work or walk-from-work is imposed by the marginalizing authorities upon the common people who cannot afford to use personal or official cars.This class, or call it third class citizens, comprises the majority, namely the matatu (minibus) commuters,  the bicycle peddlers, the boda-boda cyclists, etc. The end of the list, just after the peddlers, are the pedestrians.

These groups are related closely to one another and they IRONICALLY form third class citizens in the young

True, boda boda have the highest crime/accident rate in town, but should it warrant amputating this arm of our third-class economy? I thought it is the work of the Ministry to strengthen the traffic laws to arrest those who overload or overspeed. (Photo by the author: Jonny Penny).

Republic that has just voted to remove this classism. maybe the second class are the majority who own personal cars, while the first class could be the government V8-cruisers and their chidlren. That is why one of the exhausted pedestrian commented after galloping one pin of cold water at Nyakuron, “Who and why do they impose such a rule? I think it was just one of their party-going children who came home late and had to offer an excuse in the name of a traffic jam. “Dad, I knocked my car…. or I delayed in the jam because the boda-boda boys were everywhere in the city centre (which one is the centre, Mr. Deputy Minister?). In the morning, the old man can just walk up with a decree to chase away those good-for-nothing noise-makers.” This cynical analysis had some fake truth or vague facts in it. Otherwise, do you believe that accidents will now stop that the boys are out of the imaginary city centre?

As I wrote in my previous post on this blog (click the link at the bottom of this post), it is wise analysing this issue from many points of view, not only on the security point of view. By the way, the big men may think making this class of our economy forcefully jobless will solve the security level (read ‘reduce accident death toll’) but that force of the law is a farce by their law! We know that an idle mind (esp that of a youth) is the devil’s workshop. So if we eliminate 1,000 young men from operating in the city’s main roads, which are only two as per now, will we be secure otherwise? What will stop them from waylaying these V8 girls or Hummer boys and forcefully tax them (the Mungiki rule) so they could also survive. Of course, they also voted against the creation of the third class citizenship by the Jallaba. So who is that artificial Jallaba to make us realize classification by economic, social and political status in our new Sudan?

And if my readers/leaders get tempted to call or label me ‘jealous’ while I am just being zealous here, I hereby defend myself. If we are made to walk from the University of Juba to Equity Bank in Juba, or from the same University roundabout (where I am supposed to stop every morning and walk to work, or to start every evening and walk from work) to Jebbel Market, or from thereabout to Juba Airport, or from whereabouts to thereabouts, then who will send his boys to collect me for a crime of calling a spade a spade? I mean, the matatus that the Salvas might have thought to carry us around are confined to the two trunk roads of the city. So if I want to cross from Muniki (Seventh Day) Roundabout, or from the University Roundabout to Juba International Airport, I have to walk upto there to catch my flight to Nairobi or Malakal. So why?

Because of the deputy ministerial decree. About what? About stopping accidents by eliminating the quickest and most efficient (and also most dangerous) means of public transport, if not public investment, from the city. Hii my leaders…! That’s why I pray very emotionally everyday against the declaration of war between the two political divorcees, the South and North Sudan. Why? With this rate of Algebraic elimination method being adapted by our ‘Decree Declarers’, we shall have no wounded heroes after the war. Why? They would all be amputated to remove the problematic part of the body. Yes, if our current Salvas were like this during the war, our independence parade would have not been graced by our withered-legged Jesuses (mauhokeen). They would have been cut long ago to solve the problem. If not this, then why should our humble leaders who led us out of the bush into the new nation with all our bad parts just decide to do such a segregative pruning of the economy or of the nation?

Now, as I am updating this page for the second time, I am going to walk from Oasis Camp in Juba to Konyo-konyo stage. In the picture, before the Decree, I used to cross easily from Grand Hotel (where my picture was taken) to any part of the town as there are no buses on such corners. Now, we have to walk it. I regret this comment I made to this picture on my Facebook wall last April." FROM BORDER TO BORDER: God bless BODA BODA, the most real, ideal deal connectors in town! Alas, at last, at least, they made me make it today!!!)

Should we really cut away the whole arm when the problem is on the stubborn index finger? Anyway, should we cut or cure? I mean, will we eliminate accidents by removing the unnecessary nuisance in the boda bodas or we treat the accidents. By treating the accidents, the Ministry of Interior, which now looks like the ministry of inferior in the eyes of the long-distance walkers, like this ’John Walker’, should just implement the traffic laws. Instead of employing 1,000 armed policemen, the Rajaf type (you may know what I mean by Rajaf type) to beat the mobile business boys out of the city, they should do what Anyang recommends above and instead deploy hundreds of traffic police to fine the hell out of the speeding drivers or cyclists. Somebody should also understand that most drivers (esp those of generals and ministers) do not know if the boda boda boys have rights to road, too.

Thanks to Abraham Jok Mooch, he struggled to humble those notorious cyclists into a Boda-boda Association. So the Traffic Police general should just sit with this Boda-Boda general and discuss the solutions to accidents or overpopulation of the cyclists in town. This is where they can weed out the foreign ones and the teen daredevils, leaving the most efficient and affordable ones on the road, even in the city centres. By imposing the traffic rules with heavy fines on obvious offences such as speed limits, wrong turns, etc. which always cause the accidents, the economy and politics (towards 2014) would not be affected in any way.

Anyway, if I might have overreacted, it is because I have just walked too much as a result of the decree, but I thought I was making a point here. Ok, to cut short this ‘offence’, I advise my bosses to think about the Late Dr. Garang’s theory on part of self-started sector of the economy such as the boda-boda. When security offices compiled, complained and reported their findings to Dr. Garang in 1999, he ‘disappointed them. When they complained of the black market in dangerous commodities such as (not motor-cycles) but submachine guns by our own soldiers to e.g. Agoro, he simple asked,

“Who started that market?” When they said it started itself, he grinned and commented in a matter-of-fact tone, “Then don’t disturb them, it will stop itself the way it started.” This is because in a war economy like ours of the 90s or in a laisez faire economy like ours of the 2000s, we should allow the market forces to carry out the change themselves. We just need the law enforcers to watch how such a market force stirs or stars. If you add a finger, you risk a double-directional damage.

Finally, I would advise our security forces to leave us alone or join us along (journalists and cyclists); and we all march northwards for the common enemy. If the common enemy cannot unite us at our hour of nation’s call like now, then who will? Meanwhile, somebody please interpret to H.E. the Deputy Minister that what he is forcing us to adapt now, the Walk-to-Work or Walk-from-Work transport system will not go down well with his Boss if he comes back from America. At least, I believe, his friend Yoweri Museveni has explained to him what that means, and who practises it: The Walk-to-Work strike! God forbid here!

For similar reactions to Decrees, follow the following links:

1- http://weakleak.wordpress.com/2011/11/24/the-increase-of-decrees-as-means-of-governance-in-south-sudan/

2- http://weakleak.wordpress.com/2011/09/30/save-us-from-inverted-investors/

Meanwhile, as usual, I wind of with a poem from ‘The Black Christs of Africa’:

***

Poem 39

**

The Tower of Power

*

                                                                      Ours is a story biblical

In history diabolical.

Once upon a time,

There was no dime,

Only nothing but love,

 traded by one noble dove

Among a people of one tribe.

There was not a crime of bribe,

Not nepotism  but  mutual trust,

Not for money or honey was lust.

All were considered of equal folks,

Zero tolerance on  more equal fox.

 When they felt  themselves firmly,

They said, look  we’re one family,

Come, let’s build ourselves forts,

A citadel with bricks our hearts,

Be it called ‘Tower of Power’.

But detractors saw power,

“Behold, oh, one lineage,

Speaking one language!

This is just their beginning!

Nothing will be impossible for them,

Come, let’s go and confuse their language,

That they understand one another’s speech as a babble.”

So Lo-see-far scattered them all over the earth, failing the building.

There, because of this confusion, the project was called The Tower of Babel.

**

Relevant Quote: The Babelization of great capitals and their cultural relativism are to me the unmistakeable sign of modernity. Juan Goytisolo (1931 - ), Spanish novelist and essayist.

 

How Corruption is Corrupted in South Sudan…!

Corruption? What is it? No, though I can feel and find it, I fear to define it. I can be wrong, hence criticized. It is infinite in terms of time and scope, and indefinite in terms of timing and meaning. There is a dictionary which attempts to define it here, but that still does not satisfy me.

corruption

cor·rup·tion [kə rúpsh'n]

(plural cor·rup·tions)

noun

1.	dishonesty for personal gain: dishonest exploitation of power for personal gain
2.	depravity: extreme immorality or depravity
3.	undesirable change: an undesirable change in meaning or another error introduced into a text during copying
4.	corrupting of something: the corrupting of something or somebody, or the state of being corrupt
5.	linguistics altered word or phrase: a word or phrase that has been altered from its original form
6.	rotting: rotting or putrefaction, or the state of being rotten or putrid (archaic)

[14th century. Via French < Latin corruption- < corruptus(see corrupt)]

Microsoft® Encarta® 2006. © 1993-2005 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

For those who are allergic to correction; in other words, those who see correction as criticism, I have to pick the meaning from Nos. 3 and 5, in relation to the verb ‘corrupted’ and Nos. 1 and 6 for the noun ‘corruption’ in relation to the title of this piece.

Wh(o)y appointed this Day?

By resolution 58/4 of October 31, 2003, the UN General Assembly designated December 9 as International Anti-Corruption Day. This decision aimed to raise people’s awareness of corruption and of the role of the United Nations Convention against Corruption in combating and preventing it. The assembly urged all states and competent regional economic integration organizations to sign and ratify the United Nations Convention against Corruption (UNCAC) to ensure its rapid entry into force. UNCAC is the first legally binding, international anti-corruption instrument that provides a chance to mount a global response to corruption.

Today, December 9, 2011 is (apologies to our Holy Number 9 which falls again on) International Anti-Corruption Day. It was celebrated, say commemorated, here at Nyakuron Cultural Centre under Central Equatoria State’s Anti-Corruption unit. Don’t ask me why not at the RSS level – ask the Greater Bahr-el-Ghazal Leaders’ Council first for celebrating our National Independence Day again on December 3, 2011 (last Sato!) on which they not only invited but also honoured all the heroes and ‘sheroes’ of our liberation struggle. It was a national event, heavily attended by all from President, Vice President, etc. who were showered with gifts and presses, including declaring Salva Kiir ‘The Founding Father of the Nation‘ (RSS?)! Nevertheless, this anti-corruption day, though under the state, was also national, but was officiated at the level of a Deputy Governor of Central Equatoria. So why is that? Let us assume so for the sake of not sounding critical on the effort made by this public watchdog. But count how many efforts so far…

The Theme on this corrupted picture of the today's Anti-Corruption Day banner reads: ZERO TOLERANCE FOR CORRUPTION IN SOUTH SUDAN! whereby 'zero tolerance' may either mean the tolerance is not there or it is a nought there (tolerance at a empty space) against corruption!

Now, before we talk of anything and everything of that kind, the word corruption itself was corrupted! How? (See the corrupted picture of the corrupted banner, left). My focus is on the theme of the  2011 IACD, which goes: “Act Against Corruption Today”, with the slogan: “Corruption, Your No Counts”. However, all these were avoided for one reason or the other that they(ou) know best. The global theme which goes against their guts, ‘Act Against Corruption Today’, was South-Sudanized into the usually monotonous “ZERO TOLERANCE FOR (not against) CORRUPTION IN SOUTH SUDAN”.

Funny enough! This is how corruption is corrupted in South Sudan. The theme there to the layman, leave alone the linguists, means “Zero (empty) tolerance for (in support of) corruption in South Sudan”. We don’t (or if we do) need a dictionary again to define the possessive adverb/preposition, then I only cut, according to the theme of today, the definition No. 21 out of 22 applications of the word ‘for’ as follows:

Microsoft® Encarta® 2006. © 1993-2005 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

21.	adverb , prep in support of something: in favor of or in support of something prep Who’s for the motion and who’s against it? adverb Ten voted for, and eleven against.

Do you think it is intentional or a typo for the Government of the Republic of South Sudan to dodge the directly flesh-piercing theme of the day, ‘Act Against Corruption Today’, and replace it with something that grammatically and drammatically sounds like ”Act in Favour of Corruption Today!”?  Why for our Freedom’s sake would somebody do such a thing? Is it not enough or does it not speak volumes that no leader has been arrested and imprisoned since 2005? Now, it is  officially declared, take it or leave it!

How did the mistake come about? When the title was corrupted, the root cause is still corruption. How? The contract to the Commission’s secretary/communications officer being given on merits of tactical know-who instead of technical know-how. As if that is not enough, the contract of printing the publicly displayed  messages on banners being offered to novice companies, which might be on corrupt deals. Hence, leaving corruption campaign message being corrupted as in the picture above.

Putting a wrong person in the right place, or the right person in the wrong place, or the wrong person in the wrong place, altogether, did not start with the Anti-Corruption Commission in this case. I had already developed ulcers with the previous jobs or campaigns, for example. The SPLA’s national anthem team spoiled it when they avoided poets and lyricists and replaced them with some generals, who came up with ‘cemented our national foundation’. This should grammatically read ‘…our nation’s foundation’. This should be discussed separately if you doubt my argument, or let us just leave it until we grow up in language later, if not our children to correct it.

Secondly, the SPLM Secretariat for Mobilization (or how do they call it?) already spoiled things for me in this grammatically and internationally known slogan: “Yes to…No to….”. The SPLM or GOSS of the day (as if) forcefully programmed it unto billboards, politicians’ mouths,  musician’s lyrics, and public’s chants as “No FOR Unity, Yes FOR Separation”. This is probably the first time this slogan changed form and meaning in the world’s campaign history, un/fortunately in South Sudan.

I said, the right spelling is MAUSOLEUM, he called me an intruder and called a police. He insisted on writing Garang's MOUSELEUM in front of a large camera crew. I felt and fell ill!

Another one, which I found being done there and then during the referendum voting, was the labeling of the polling station with this popular and sacred name of the venue of Dr. John Garang Mausoleum. When some polling officer took a marker pen and tried to write on the first ballot box, he messed it. When told, he quarrelled and sent some guys out. The second time, he tried on his own to correct it but still read: ‘Dr. John Garang’s Mouseleum Poling Center’. When I lost my linguistic temper and intervened, he called the police, “Take away this intruder”. So I had to take this picture (see it beside) and continued on my queue and voted. Thank God, I did not vote wrongly. But what continued to pain me and well wishers of this new Nation was, why put wrong people at the right places?

This question was asked by one of my foreign colleagues yesterday when I received two different phone calls from my fellow members of the civil society coalition requesting me to help them write presentations for the International Engagement Conference for South Sudan in Washington DC. ”But why send delegates who will not represent people well outside there? Why didn’t you go?” he wondered. I simply played it down that I was not in that meeting when the selection was done. Actually, the reality with our delegations or employment or deployment in South Sudan is based on the principle of Representation, not Presentation. I mean they s/elect and send people who will merely represent, but not really present for, us in those foreign fora.

The same worry is on every South Sudanese’s mind about the appointment of ambassadors and their junior

Different faces of corruption: As if this mzee has heeded Gen. Salva Kiir's advice of opening a secret bank account for those who have stolen and hidden millions in foreign banks to stealthily return and deposit our money in that account. Only God and Comrade Joshua will now know how, where, when and why...?

diplomats. Nhial Bol of The Citizen newspaper once described them on his ‘Straight Talk’ column as “drinking diplomats who will open bottles of beer with the lip of a pistol instead of the opener”, just for recognition in those foreign clubs, bars and pubs! As we are fresh and always refreshed with aweful stories of the queer behaviour of some of us, sons and daughters of liberators (The Big Ones) in East Africa, one would not be surprised to see the same characters, who cannot address a press conference or write a good media report, appointed as media or communication attaches in our RSS embassies. They are already in waiting to join the joints instead of working to educate the world about the potentials of our new born nation. Due to lack of competence, they will neither represent nor sell us in a positve way. If I could ask, have you ever read good media articles or reports about South Sudan in the country where you are? Why is our baby nation not featuring in the world media? I am being particular on media because it is my field of expertise. So let nobody take me for a jealous writer, am just a zealous one. 

 To prove how corruption is roaring wild, while roaming our country through impunity by immunity, contact your old news sources and memories of the scenes and experiences of open public dramas on this piece of cancerous economic literature called ‘corruptioniasis’.  I was entertained last week when the Petroleum and Mining minister (Dhieu Dau) dialed a police number and handed over an Israel investor to spend a night behind bars for giving him only US $5,000.

This is the only first open sincerity of anti-corruption fight by a government figure in the history of the Republic of South Sudan, dating back to 2005. Media Thomases and Tea Parliamentarians are all inflated with questions: what if the figure was 50,000 or 500,000? Why this time since CPA? Why only this minister? Is it the first attempt of bribery since then? etc? However, the lawyer to this Israeli, Mr. Kiir Chol, argued that his client was neither corrupt nor trying to corrupt the minister with that amount. That he was trying to open the suitcase to give the minister his company document when a bundle of dollar notes jumped out. Hmm? Only God and minister and the investor now know how and why…?  

Back to the open rumour, which is no humour to both of us, the cheats and the cheated. I hear the ‘Dhieus’ would be forced to declare their wealth. I bet by my health, it is as im/possible as requesting you to declare your other parts!  But our Big Man has chosen to execute it in this way as the baton was passed behind to be taken to the finishing point by his First Runner up against his firsts ‘runners down’, as read on y/our government rediffusion set (call it SSTV) a few days ago, thus.

“We will enforce the obligation of all public officials to publish their income and financial assets. We will provide an opportunity of an anonymous return account for civil servants and public officials to return any diverted funds, obligating them to publish their assets from the date of independence,” he (the president) added.

If you want to continue reading similar stories I wrote earlier about this topic, hit this link:

About the new hybrid type and hype of corruption called ‘Bribalism = Bribery + tribalism…

- http://weakleak.wordpress.com/2011/09/22/bribalism-an-hybrid-type-of-corruption-born-with-south-sudan/

The cry of the Youth of the South: Save us from Inverter Investor!

- http://weakleak.wordpress.com/2011/09/30/save-us-from-inverted-investors/

*

Poems from ‘The Black Christs of Africa.

**

Chapter 7:

The Eruption, Irruption, Interruption and Disruption of Corruption

 ***

Poem 74

*

It should be defined

 *

It should be defined

It shouldn’t be refined

It shouldn’t be divined.

*

It erupts,

It disrupts,

It interrupts;

*

Like pregnancy

In its stagnancy,

Its malignancy

*

Is the enemy

Of our economy,

Of our autonomy.

*

Bulging like anthill,

It takes us uphill

And makes us ill.

*

It’s a dis-ease,

A deadly disease,

Of no cease for decease.

*

An ulcer,

A cancer,

A canker…

 *

Relevant Quote

We have a cancer within, close to the Presidency, that is growing. It is growing daily.

John Dean (1938 – )    U.S. presidential counsel, 1973.

From a taped conversation with the president, Richard Nixon. Referring to the Watergate scandal.

***

Poem 75

*

Our National Foodbowl Championship

 *

Swi-itch!

Goes the starting whistle,

For the champing champions to wrestle,

Kicking the dust up and down,

Tossing the bowl here and there,

*

From chimp to champ

From county to country

From intra-national

To international

Tournament.

*

Our politi-called football championship,

That costs a million dollar a goal,

For which every striker strives for personal scores,

With golden trophies to decorate individuals’ rooms,

Is on full swing this season.

*

Our nation-all foodball match,

A game with fatal knockout of the weak,

The socio-politically unconnected part-tease-fans;

A game where participation is on no technical know-how,

Where qualification is only on tactical know-who,

Is on full swing this season.

*

That is our so-called social game of unity,

Of unity in units,

At which Man-chaser United

Foodbowl Club

Clutch, clash and crash

With Liver-full

Foodbowl Club.

*

Relevant Quote

The world is divided into people who do things and people who get the credit. Try, if you can, to belong to the first class. There’s far less competition.

Dwight Whitney Morrow (1873 - 1931)U.S. diplomat and politician.

Letter to his son

*

Poem 77

*

Our  Moneyfacturers

*

When we earn money

Through monthly salaries,

They hunt money

Through daily deliveries.

*

When we make money

Through stall businesses,

They mint money

Through tall busynesses.

*

As we pocket our coins

After a long day with coils,

They stuff their paper bags

With their paper bucks.

*

When we become manufacturers

Because we just got educated,

They become moneyfacturers;

Of course, they got eatducated.

**

 Relevant Quote

This is an impressive crowd—the haves and the have-mores. Some people call you the elites; I call you my base.

George W. Bush

Speech at Al Adams $800-a-plate fund-raiser, October 20, 2000

***

Poem 82

*

                                     Officially

                      Licensed

 Thieves

 *

You’re put in charge of our fund,

You put them aside for your fun.

You organize for your fans fanfare,

You use our funds for your fun-fare.

You call yourself a chief,

We regard you as a thief.

Lo, you continue to steal,

Your licence shan’t be still.

For you are depriving the public

Of the development of their republic.

Pests of our peace, may you rest apiece

In the Land you suck, milk, fail to appease.

Heed to this alarm bell to wake up the nation,

To condemn them who feed us with the ration.

Damn the official thieves of, for and by the people,

And them that issue them the licences of the people.

Tingled

Tinkers, tinkle

The jingle jangle.

 *

Relevant Quote

If you give to a thief he cannot steal from you, and he is then no longer a thief. William Saroyan.

*

Poem 84

*

The Kinship with a Kingship

*

Even the monarch’s co-cousins

Dip their hands deep into our coffers,

And fool us, and pull for themselves dozens;

Of course none of all gives them the state’s offers.

*

All those self-made Royalties

Do claim from our toils’ royalties.

They assume and consume of powers real regal,

Yet their assumptions for consumptions are not legal.

*

By hierarchy, we’re their loyalists,

And by oligarchy, they’re our royalists.

We know to the monarchy they’re a far kinship,

It is they by remote anarchy who fake on us kingship.

**

Poem 134

*

 An Auntie Corruption Commission

*

Auntie has a nice niece.

Her name is Eunice.

But I call her Younice.

*

Not only is she beautiful,

She is duly dutiful.

Oh, her downfall: being bountiful!

*

The girl is a model, a strawberry,

Without any nature’s forgery,

Save auntie, her cash-ier and secret-ary.

*

Every phone call on her is billed

With no sense of guilt

By her aunt whose wealth is built.

*

She is a precious shop

In which what is sold is her hope.

Alas, she joins and enjoys hip-hop!

*

Everywhere, every time accessible.

Who says for women is impossible

In this deal to be incorruptible?

*

 Relevant Quote

Whether our reformers admit it or not, the economic and social inferiority of women is responsible for prostitution. Emma Goldman.

 

Kiir Says: Change Your (whose?) Behaviour to Kick AIDS out of South Sudan!

With matters to do with HIV/AIDS, it is one thing to carry out the campaign, but it is another thing to carry on with the campaign!

When President Salva Kiir rebuked the nation on the International World AIDS Day at Dr. Garang Mausoleum (Independence Square) on December 1, “Change your behaviour…!”, the fore fingers were flying here and there, mostly between the youth and the elders. So who should change what first? Who is responsible for spreading AIDS in South Sudan?

Before we heed to that caution and answer that question, first check, are you sure you are not one of the 128,000+ South Sudanese living with HIV/AIDS in 2011? How do/not you know that? (Watch this space for a full analysis tomorrow as I go for more research tonight…..).

However, while waiting for a full analysis of the president’s speech on AIDS, Click this link to answer the elders’ part of the question as we wait for the youth’s: http://www.gurtong.net/Forum/tabid/81/forumid/92/postid/46141/scope/posts/Default.aspx

Meanwhile, consider these poems from the health chapter of my poetry book, The Black Christs of Africa, Chapter 8: Health Best, Wealth Rest.

*

Poem 87

*

The Lethal Penisillean Injection!

*

It’s ill-legal,

Yet it’s injected.

It’s all lethal,

Yet it isn’t rejected.

Like a single dose of Penicillin V,

In an antibiotic vial,

This simple toss of penis-ill-lean v,

An un-antibody virus,

Hysterically doused with sweet injection,

Eventually roused with bitter interjection,

Ends in fatal infection,

Hence in total rejection.

This delicious vaccination,

Regarded as malicious abomination,

Regretted with social discrimination,

Is all over the nation.

*

Relevant Quote

AIDS obliges people to think of sex as having, possibly the direst of consequences: suicide. Or murder.

Susan Sontag (1933 - 2004)

U.S. writer.

AIDS and its Metaphors

**

Poem 88

**

The WWW III

 *

The whole world in a woe war,

It has been in it for millennia.

But that is a lie by the media,

It was not a real worldwide war.

*

We’re in the worst world war

Ever thought—never fought

By all countries caught and taught.

The third world war

*

Is ageless and sageless,

Statusless and stateless,

Classless and sexless,

Religionless and regionless.

*

It’s even a dotcom warfare

That attacks the intellectual geniuses,

And spreads faster than internet viruses.

Of the WWW III, aka Aids, beware!

*

Relevant Quote

If art is to confront AIDS more honestly than the media have done, it must begin intact, avoid humor and end in anger.

Edmund White (1940 - )

U.S. writer.

***

Poem 89

**

                              Count

                                          d

                                             O

                                                 W

                                                       n              to          Your Grave!

                                   Once you consume:                       you assume:

One second of your age –                     one million kilometres to your grave.

One minute of your age –                     one hundred thousand km to your grave.

One hour of your age –                    ten thousand kilometres to your grave.

One day of your age –                        one thousand kilometres to your grave.

One week of your age –                          one hundred kilometres to your grave.

One month of your age –                    ten kilometres to your grave.

One decade of your age –                    one kilometre to your grave.

One generation of yr age –                  one metre to your grave.

One century of your age –                    one centimetre to your grave.

One meal of your day –               one million kilometres to your grave.

One day of hunger –           one hundred thousand km to your grave.

One stick of cigarette –            ten thousand kilometres to your grave.

One bottle of alcohol –      one thousand kilometres to your grave.

One bite of mosquito –       one hundred kilometres to your grave.

                                   One incident of accident –   ten kilometres to your grave.

One shot of bullet –     one kilometre to your grave.

One doze of HIV – zero kilometres to your grave.

One huddled bundle of all – one hurdle jump to your grave!

*

 Relevant Quote

For all our days have passed away in Your wrath; we finish our years like a sigh.

The days of our life are seventy years; and if by reason of strength they are eighty years,

Yet their boast is labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.

So teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.

Psalms 90: 9, 10, 12.

 

The Youth of the South: No Longer Youthful and Useful but Made Youthless and Useless in the rungs and the ranks of their Nation Building!

members of youth participates in the Youth for Separation campaign launch on 09/09/2010 at Dr. Garang's Mausoleum. That time, there was no Greater-this-and-that kind of youth at campaigned for referendum separation alone. (Photo by the author).

From our household experience, not everything that looks new is useful and not everything that looks old is useless. Similarly, from our new nationhood experience, not everybody that looks youthful is useful and not everybody that looks youthless is useless. Why? It is a philosophical puzzled which is muddled in a maze of culture, politics and corruption that needs genuine geniuses to unravel.

Frankly speaking, we are tired of being routinely appointed by our politicians (I call them poli-teachers)everyday for the posts that we even all know are compulsorily coming in our Republic of Tomorrow: “Youth, you are the leaders of Tomorrow.” Another line, which is another lie from our leaders-cum-elders, the statement that ’I personally hate like my back that I do not see’ — to borrow from Bor Dinka saying – also goes like this, ”Youth, you are the backbone of this country”.

Again, another thing (the reason why) I hate even most is that the speakers, from the way we judge them, seem to ignore (or are they being ignorant?) of the arrival of the day ‘tomorrow’ and the definition of the word ‘backbone’. Brothers and sisters of my age, it is a fact well known by all of us that that day or time they call ‘Tomorrow’ is a day that remains on the other side of the night forever, so who are they to fool us that we are leaders of that day? None of ancestors from Adam down to them has ever seen the day called ‘tomorrow’. And so shall we not. And so shall our children and our children’s children not see the day called ‘Tomorrow’.

Similarly, why do they, call them the Brains or Stomachs of this country, know that we, youths, are their Backbones yet treat us like their bad bones? How can you intentionally neglect or break the bone at your back and you continue boasting of being a good walker or a good worker? This is all hypocrisy! By the way, the ‘how’ question of how our country is making the youth youthless, hence, useless needs another piece like this if you do not have those examples vivid in your mind’s eyes.

That aside, for that matter, the real subject matter as seen from the title means that there is no usefulness in our youthfulness if we begin to follow the examples of our uncles and brag around with the feathers of our fathers. If we leave our own potentials and cooperation as leaders of this country, both of today and tomorrow, and begin to dance to the tune and adapt to the tone of our elders, then we are turning our future from boom to doom. Well, before I forget, our current Constitution stipulates that for any person to qualify for a head of this state (president), one must be from 40 to 75 years by age! So if you are 39, do not disturb them, please.

Besides all the political and social vices the current youths are enticed to indulge themselves in, my argument to augment the appeal is justified in this quotation from Angok Arthur Akuien Chol, new chairman of the Greater Bahr-el-Ghazal Youth that has just concluded its highly contested conference in Aweil ahead of another controversial Greater Bahr-el-Ghazal Community Leaders Council’s National Celebration of Independence now going on at Nyakuron Cultural Centre, Juba.

Reacting to the protests from the sidelined SPLM Youth League leaders, Angok said,“As a non-partisan youth initiative, we would like to condemn the acts of these enemies intending to disrupt our peaceful conference, and assured the visiting delegates of adequate security provision.” http://www.sudantribune.com/Greater-Bahr-el-Ghazal-youth-form,40847.

I have no problem with the rests, including his competence as a new regional youth leader, but my worry is this. By copying the slogans and voice and the mentality of our war-traumatized elders now running the country, should we just label any person who expresses their opinion in a different way from the leader’s as ‘this enemy’? I thought we would just come fresh from schools with a new language of peace so that we change our liberation warriors. I have an excuse for them because the common enemy made them adapt such a language. Mr. Chairman, now, how come you just copied and pasted such words of most destruction (WMD) normally used between Khartoum and Juba! That is why I think I have to refer these youths to my book’s preface again:

Amol Majak of Bor hugs with Mubarak Kuku of Nuba Mountains in Bor Freedom Square. Amol from the Koryom Team (comprising Mundari and Dinka) threw Mubarak of Muormuor (Nuba and Lotuko) in the SPLA's 28th Anniversary of the Liberation Struggle (May 16) being celebrated in Bor on May 28, 2011, just before politics tore us apart with our brothers, the Nuba who are now in dillemma between the two independent states of Sudans. (Photo by the author: John Penn).

“Since it is inevitable to stop the idea whose timing has matured, I see it our moral duty in the Sudan to replace the swords of war with words of war, in order to displace wards of war with wards of wares. Yes, but yet, we must not be only drifting or sifting, but wholly lifting and shifting, with shrift and thrift, from words of war to war of words, as we forget the past and forge ahead past the present , through this favourite slogan: Aluta Continua— the struggle continues. Since Sudan has been suffering hard – but is now hardly recovering – from cancer of wars through ulcer of words, I, the expressively ulcerated (South) Sudanese, am suffering from cancer of words. That is why you will find this slogan not sung with anaemia but with leukaemia of words, totaling to about or above 77,000 in this poetic volume, just as many as in other writings of my fighting.” (This book was written before we were named ‘South Sudan’).

Another request to make to my fellow youth of the South is that we should start inventing our own wheels to suit our own ways. Let us not just copy the old ways of doing things, which is especially the order of the day with our older generation of the day. This I call “leadership by eldership”. This is evidenced in the way many avuncular office bearers’ notion, the type I quoted in the first paragraphs, full of belittling words of suppressions such as ‘young man, leaders of tomorrow’…, name them.

For instance, I was pissed off the other week when one of the Ministries’ occupants, regardless of being younger than me in age but older than me in the body, asked me (in Dinka), “Raanthi, ye luel wude?” This means, “Young man, what are you saying?” I replied, “Nothing, I am just idling around.” Good enough, he did not realize that I really meant ‘You’re just idling around here’.

In other development, one thing that still worries me is why the women are given a 25% affirmative action but the youth with nothing. I think the Government of South Sudan just assumes that the youths fall on either side of the gender in terms of power sharing. Un/fortunately, none of us who are not closely ‘fathered’, ‘mothered’, ’uncled’ or ‘auntied’ in the government cannot dream of penetrating that well knit wall of nepotism, favouritism, tribalism which is blended with an old monarchical or African magi theory of ‘leadership by eldership’.  However, given the presence of the youth in the present government, one can give some credit to states like Northern Bahr el Ghazal, Warrap and Eastern Equatoria for recognizing the youth in their governments. Funny enough, if there were a sacrifice to be made with a youth representative in the upper realms of the government, I think, Jonglei State would go to hell wholesale! Maybe let’s wait and see if Governor Kuol Manyang will have a baby-face among the new faces he is going to select among the old faces he is going to renew. As I am writing this article, Jonglei State has no government, pending new shuffling.

My speed of being ulcerated by such misdoings is being accelerated by the way our leaders-in-elders allow themselves to be fooled by the youths from neighbouring countries, who are not in any circumstance better than us in providing services to our new country. I felt like stabbed in the back when I found one of my former coursemates from Makerere busy providing consultancy to GOSS in Bor two years I ago. When I bumped into him, I asked, “OB (old boy), what are you doing here in my hometown. He said he was a consultant. “In what?” I asked. “Currichuram Development”, he croaked in his heavily Luganda-invaded English and smiled in a way that tells me something. Guess what it is. He very well knew from our Makerere notes that curriculum is a culture of the people and for the people, incorporated and glossed with modern knowledge, by the very people, to be taught in schools for the development of that particular people (that’s my own view point). So by what miracle will a young man from another peoples’ background come to develop a curriculum of another people?

To complete the whole picture of why and how the youths of the South is very youthful but not being used fully, just take a break and continue on another page of the same blog on this link entitled, ‘A Call to the Public and Parliament: Save us from Invertor Investors!’ by clicking: http://weakleak.wordpress.com/2011/09/30/save-us-from-inverted-investors/.

However, don’t forget to pass through my usual poems here and find out why my last Recommendation is: let us be (Poem 123):

***

The Bride Tribe

**

Ours is a new tribe

Of scribes to describe

Our real fire drive

That makes us strive

Through the cloud of strife

With not our metal but mental knife.

**

We cherish our pride

Of being the new bride,

A generation born bright

With every tangible right.

Having paid our bloody price

To win and to pin up this noble prize,

**

We urge our senile tribe

Not to expose us to bribe

Our way of life with a dime.

Hither come our ripe time.

For in our current prime

Must we admit and omit all that is crime,

**

And commit our youthfulness

Into all that is usefulness.

In order to enjoy our fruitfulness,

The bride tribe needs truthfulness.

Tomorrow comes not in its fullness

Today must we explore and exploit our youthfulness.

**

Relevant Quote

Let no man despise thy youth; but be thou an example of the believers, in word, in conduct, in love, in spirit, in faith, in purity.

St. Paul

1 Timothy 4: 12

**

The Youth of the South

The author and his Red Army colleagues preparing their meal in Omere Minors Camp (Eastern Equatoria) in 1994, the memory of which prompted this poem now quoted from the author's second anthology, 'The Jongley Jongleur: and 100 Pennets' as shown at the left hand side with the title: 'The Youth of the South'.

**

               This is an all-time youth

which never has been uncouth

even during pervasive revolution

that turned into persuasive evolution

in their time of historical metamorphosis

they withstood their formidable nemesis

and in pursuit for justice remain useful

pushing it to eternity yet youthful

which never have been uncouth

oh the youth of the South!

***

Poem 106

**

I’m used less

*

I grow illiterate

And thus become useless.

I enroll on the street,

Not because I am useless.

I get married too early

As my brother gets graduated,

And I thus become useless.

When I grow up and then down,

They in my umpteen shoes

Brand me as useless oldy,

But I’m just being youthless.

I’m useless because I’m used less.

 

Good Readers are Good Leaders: Congratulations, You are my 10,000th Weekly Weakleaker!

Dear Ready Reader,

CONGRATULATIONS, YOU WERE MY 10,000TH READER ON THIS BlOG ON SATURDAY, NOV. 26, 2011!

If Baby Tabby, my daughter, could open a book at the age of 2, how about you at the age of 12, 22, 32, 42, 52, 62...?

Just to repeat what you can see on your right hand side of the widget area on your favourite blog, since it’s my belief that a good reader is a good leader, I prayed last Sunday to have my God pour upon you, especially your brain, the knowledge that can make you not only a diligent reader but also an intelligent leader wherever you work.

Especially if you were one of the 300 visitors of the Weakleaks site on Saturday, Nov. 26, 2011, I warmly appreciate and congratulate you, my readers, my leaders, and also encourage you to keep on encouraging me to write even more. By diligently and dedicatedly following my weekly postings on my Weakleak via Facebook,  you explore my literal mind and exploit my literary mine, hence a blessing from the bottom of my heart dialled from the button of my art.

I have observed, among the over 10,000 followers of this blog, that more than 90% are not pessimistic critics but ready to give me their unique critiques on my Pennique techniques, news, views, interviews, reviews, previews, overviews, etc. That is the incentive or the fuel that keeps me writing into this financial vacuum (blogging for you on free internet), which is viewed as a failure by my detractors. “Imagine if all those ten thousand readers on your blog were diverted to a newspaper by your column, would you still be using a boda-boda now?” asked one of my friends who wished I were a columnist to one of our current papers. But I told him politely this morning, “I know what you mean, especially when I brought 10,000 readers to The Sudan Mirror. What did I get by the end of the day? A university dropout and a weeklong ordeal in the hand of kidnappers in 2006, followed by stabbing a year later!”

If we are scared of opening the book openly, then let's try a secret reading club.

However, the kidnappers and stabbers of this writer, me, those days were not the ones arresting Dengdit Ayok and Ngor Garang, today. If they were, bet me by heaven and hell, I would be in USA or Australia in the name of asylum seeker today. They were all my fellow fighters for the common cause that took us to the bush, and brought us back from the bush to Juba. Where is that cause now if most of us are ‘vacuum writers’ while our leaders are hiring our former schoolmates from our neighbouring countries to write reports and letters for them at our expense? I was once shocked to see my fellow coursemate, a Ugandan, working as a curriculum consultant in our Ministry of Education. I felt like I was stabbed at the back.

Reading, I believe, is a lifelong classroom between you and the paper.

Come on, my reader. I am writing about you, not about them, this time. You are a leader better than they are if you can find this and other similar writings online. Nobody, if not less than 10%, of our current leaders, give themselves enough time to read and research about how to run a country, a ministry, a county, a company, etc. from other advanced countries through the internet. “I am not a dotcom!” said one of the directors when asked whether he had read any background literature to the project he was presenting in a certain conference about education in South Sudan.

My problem is on reading. If all our leaders were readers, we would not experience project problems in the ministries today. For instance, and by instincts, the millions of dollars/pounds being spent on a government ministers’ ‘retreat to discuss projects’ with their counterparts in Kenya would be saved for our roads and other projects like electricity and water, which are on a defecit budget. Some friend lied to me that the trip, according to GOSS’ Gossips of the Tea Parliament under the trees over there, cost our country 3.5 million (indicate the currency here) for a number of ministers and the vice president to go to Kenya.

Ethically, my journalism and principles warn me not to rely on rumours. But even if the figures are not disclosed, is it worth it? I mean is that project worth the travel allowances and other costs involved everytime a minister(s) travels to see how it is done and sign the contract documents in that country? What I am still decrying here is lack of reading culture. The intellectual anaemia that has hit our country today is only curable by the influx of a certain post-school generation, which is still in the waiting, and which I should still recommend to maintain their patience till it happens.

And should we, at all, at least and at last, lose our patience and choose to become patients to their political marasmus and literature anaemia, then let us do it through reading and writing. As I mentioned it online the other time, we should dedicate our energies to rioting but by writing. This is the most constructive critcism that can impact not only a positive change but possible education to those who are allergic to criticism; I mean, those who mistake criticism for antagonism. When we tell them to put themselves in the right position, they tend to put us in the wrong opposition. That is why I have been rioting by writing. That is why I am calling upon our youths who know how not only to read but also to write to come out and riot by writing. That is why I warned (or moaned or mourned) in another piece of thought last week that it really causes me ulcers to find myself on the ‘wrong side’ of the government that is already on the wrong side of its own law. Real readers, not surreal leaders, may mis/understand me on this statement, but I mean it. That is why Jesus was crucified on the wrong cross, to justify Machiaveli’s belief that ‘the ultimate truth is penultimately a falsehood’. This means what is initially seen as wrong is eventually proved right; and that is by means of belated confirmation at the end of the bloated condemnation. If I am wrong, ask Hosni Mubarak, and those still struggling to put on his shoes.

So if we cow away and leave it to the few sorts of sods in the name of Penn de Ngong, Dengdit Ayok and the like, the cross will be too heavy to carry to the calvary of freedom. Even Jesus was helped to carry his cross by a north African man from the town of Arimothea (don’t check this on modern maps). So dear Josephs, given the political atmosphere of utmost fear being undergone by literary rioters (writers) today, I urge you to follow me and others closely like soldiers who are marching to the calvary by cavalry. Since I am not yet at the age and sage of being quoted, let me quote myself again but on an Easter piece I wrote in The Southern Eye newspaper a week before I was kidnapped in Kampala in 2006, “The one and only crime that I have committed, and am committing, and will be committing hereafter and thereafter is what Jesus Christ committed, telling the truth, and telling it as it is.”

This is what I told my sponsor when he warned me against indiscipline in Gulu High School in 1999, "Dear Dan, the only crime I promise to commit is smuggling, smuggling books onto the other side of the border, not on but in my brain." I am trying my best to fulfill this, but will the criticism-allergic people not interfere with my vision?

Therefore, if you share in my belief that ‘non-violent writers are none but silent rioters’ and that ‘it is our right to write’, meaning to riot silently and not violently, then join me in this eventual fight for our intellectual right; support me on the ride to write. Back to myself again, my poetry book preface has this to say about burying your anger in the book, if you want an African dictator not to find it while he is still in power:

“Thence, should one in accordance with stanza 1 of Poem VIII misguidedly think I am being critical and cynical of my mentors mentioned, one would not find any direct expression of impression or knowledge of acknowledgement for them elsewhere in this volume. Both my cattle camp and bush school experiences taught me that, for boys, appreciation is cocooned in bullying just as teaching in teasing for girls. Prove it herein. All my attitudes; including both gratitude and ingratitude, aptitude and fortitude, rectitude and certitude, solitude and solicitude, and the rest of -titude attributes, are sporadically but economically, politically but poetically, socially but emotionally sprinkled throughout the book, especially on chapters like The Horror of Terror in the Era of Error, The Leftovers, Acknowledged-men, My Selfography, My Selfistory, My Theolosophy, Tender Addenda in Gender Agenda, and everything of that kind.  Lo, we go…!

“However, on the one hand, I owe a sincere apology that a great number of the poems, plus their introduction which you are now reading, may not make sense to a great number of readers, not to mention of leaders, especially those Sudanese brothers; those browsers who turn their pages very fast: either – of course – they have not got used, or because they want not to get used to today’s world standard of reading culture, especially this written Afro-culture. On the other hand, they owe us an apology that they are unwilling to resort to reading agro-culture, whose economically returning toil is in turning the soil very fast by burning the oil very fast. Disguised idleness, be it in digging with metal tools or rigging with mental tools, is as sinful as an adulatory act of adultery, if not idolatry. Just this, Apostle Paul seconds in his epistle to Corinthians and Christians that greed and idleness are forms of idolatry, and to Thessalonians, “If anyone will not work, neither shall he eat” (2 Thessalonians 3:10). Similarly, to the ‘salonians’ (salon or saloon idlers), if anyone will not read, neither shall they reap. Lo, we go…!

Therefore, if I were a president of the Republic of Literature, I would make that a decree to publish not the literary pedigree but the literary degree in every manuscript. Lo, we go…!”

And do not forget, good readers are good leaders, just as good writers are good rioters. So from today, Sunday 27, 2011, I am proud to invite you as one of my 10,000 followers to the party celebrating both my birthday and my blog’s birthdate, which falls on December 22, 2011, just on the eve of the Eve of Christ’s mass. From that day, I will crown the winner of my blog’s “Leadership by Readership Award”. Keep looking out for an invitation online (Weakleaks and Facebook walls) to be released seven days to the day. I also hope to launch my poetry anthology, The Black Christs of Africa, from which I always quote poetic expressions on my blog. Watch this space….

As usual, let me sign off with three poems from that book’s chapter 11, entitled:

Literacy, Illiteracy and Ill-literacy

*

Poem 124

*

Illiterate or Ill-literate?

**

Y   r   U

n

Y   m   I

- not right to write?

- not ready to read?

**

Y    r    U

Do you still believe in the literary taboo that too much reading makes Tom a dull boy? If not, then Y R U not Ready to Read and not Right to Write?

n

Y    m   I

unable to:

- get education?

- give education?

**

Y   m   I

n

Y    r   U

- illiterate?

- ill-literate?

*

Relevant Quote

Ignorance and illiteracy are obviously not synonymous; even illiterate masses can cast their ballots with intelligence, once they are informed.

William Orville Douglas.

***

Poem 125

**

Let literacy make us a little racy

*

Out of womb come we vacant,

Or with matter subject to recant or decant;

And if timely done not so,

It makes us as follows sow:

**

For those illiterate

Will spread ideas akin to all illegitimacy.

For those ill-literate

Will sow seeds of discord and evil literacy.

**

The aristocrats, elites, and those who are literate

Should  resist being egocentric but be a little racy.

And they who are in one: illiterate and ill-literate

will suffer their innate disability called illiteracy.

*

Relevant Quote

Perhaps the most fateful gift an evil genius could bestow upon our times is knowledge without skill.

Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi (1746 - 1827)

Swiss educational reformer.

***

Poem 126 (based on the letter I wrote to my girlfriend when I was in Gulu High School).

Booked by books

*

Dear Abook,

I live

T’ love

U know.

But now

am in love

Wi’ the lib

And the lab.

I am hooked

To the  books,

Fully  booked up;

Hooked up by books.

Sorry for no love letter.

I promise to love you later.

Never ever mind being called sassy.

Bullies here draw and label me silly sissy,

library bookworm, laboratory hookworm,

an old mummy’s boy and ladies’ scarecrow.

But am proud to be the ladies’ scarce crow.

It’s their day to make me their boy-toy

but every dog has its own day.

Life isn’t all straight points,

…crooked like my poems.

You know now, I, right

from old Adam and Eve,

my apparent biblical parents,

all the way down to Waa and Maa,

my transparent biological parents,

am the one and only descendant

to learn how to read and write.

My mind is booked by a book,

my heart hooked by Abook.

Both are totally throttled

Into this lady-like bottle

In a win-win battle.

*

 Relevant Quote:

He felt about books as doctors feel about medicines, or managers about plays—cynical but hopeful.

Rose Macaulay (1881 - 1958)

British poet, novelist, and essayist.

 

Punished for Being Poor: How Decrees without Degrees are forcing us to Walk to Work in Juba!

MATHOK'S PUZZLE: This boda-boda has broken the law, he can kill! But he is taking food. This food is needed in the house by this schoolgirl after classes later. The boda-boda needs money for his daughter's school fees. The girl needs a boda-boda to take her home since she can't use a car... Now how do u separate them from this interdependence?

As an amorphous mob of boda-boda cyclists grumbled behind the traffic police barricade at the University of Juba roundabout, one big man shamelessly peeped out of his V8′s auto and spat out these words to whom it might concern:

“Ya bolice, keep them off. This is a degree from above. A degree from the government.” Just to make your life not difficult (in case this sentence beats your understanding), it means: “You police/man, keep them off. This is a decree from above, a decree from the goverment.”

Before I ask whether our government’s decrees are implementations for the legal rulings, either from the court of law or the parliament, just have a look at the three definitions of the term ‘decree’. I fail to understand which definition the Republic of South Sudan is using at the moment.

decree

de·cree [di kr]

noun (plural de·crees)

1.	official order: an order with the power of legislation issued by a ruler or other person or group with authority
2.	law court ruling: a ruling given by a court, especially a divorce, equity, or probate court
3.	religion divine will: in Christian belief, the will or purpose of God, interpreted through events considered to be God’s doing

Microsoft® Encarta® 2006. © 1993-2005 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

However, what I know from the rule of law, the Cabinet (Executive) that entails the President, the ministers and their mini-stars, are just implementers of the ruling from the Legislature or the Judiciary. Un/fortunately, for the case of our young nation, the reverse is true. It is as if the Legislature and the Judiciary are the implementers of the rulings (they love it as ‘Decree’) from the Executive. If not so, then how come a deputy minister could wake up one morning, call the radio stations and traffic police to not only ban our commonest means of public transport but also confiscate the motorcycles? No wonder, this is the same guy, Gen. Salva Mathok Gengdit, who is only about two months old in the position, who decreed weeks before this decreee the banning of public water supply trucks in the city. As if he is allergic to the third class citizens, where in the hell on earth is the senior minister of interior, Manani Magaya, hiding?

Dangerous Combination: An overloaded boda-boda, a long trailer truck, an open-door matatu. However, solution to this should not be eliminating one of these road users, but to open other alternative roads so that the V8 and Hummer elites class are comfortable on the tarmacadam's road. A road is a public utility where our taxes and oil money should be well spent so that no third class is denied access to it. This is Juba, not Khartoum again!(Photos by the author).

With this degree of decrees being issued everywhere by everyone in every nook and cranny of the governemnt department, including the arbitrary arrest and detention of journalists and closure of the newspaper, where are we heading? Definitely back to Khartoum Regime’s days. Where is the rule of law? I thought the rule of law means the rule made by the majority of the government i.e. the Legislative Body, that represents the will of the 10+ million South Sudanese. I thought the ministers and their deputies were s/elected by the president, not by the people. So how come they come to make quick laws in the name of decrees (I call them ‘legal shortcuts’) and impose them on those poor people who did not and will not throw a vote for them one day?

To be ‘Pennically’ jealous and zealous at the same time, I am developing ulcers with the way our current government is adopting the Khartoum’s vocabulary, if not their autocracy altogether, in Juba. The term ‘decree’ is a sign of autocracy exercised by monarchs of the 19th Century. I am always ashamed to see our dear SSTV and other Yes Media houses proudly using it throughout their news reporting. My heart really goes for the building of a gigantic titanic Noah’s ark sort of a lecture hall, the size of all the minitries complex in Juba, to cram in all those linguistically anaemic zombies and mingle them with English grammar and contemporary terminologies powered by internet and dictionaries. By so doing, we shall have migrated truly and duly from Khartoum to Juba. I mean from the Arab world to the African world, say, from Arabophone to Anglophone country.

And if at all there is nothing autocratic surging automatically from the presidential horizons and ministerial high zones, then why declare unilateral and promptu decrees, which are first imposed on the public, then later passed to the parliament? I thought the order of the flow of the law is from the people to the parliament, then to the cabinet. It is the other way round in our Republic of South Sudan. Somebody, please, define for us the meaning the term ‘Republic’. Thank God, they didn’t affix our name with something like ‘The Demorcratic Republic of…” as in the case of DR Congo.

I am reacting herewith because this is the third time I have been affected by this so-called decree since the formation of the current government after 40 days and nights of political Ramadhan in the Wilderness of Governance. Just imagine, in the first 100 days of the first president of the Republic, only one and a half laws have been legislated by the people we hired to do it for us. This is out of the five bills to be passed within Kiir’s 100 days as he promised along with a litany of schools, security, etc. I regret having been turned into such a critic, but what can we do? When we say it is wrong, the people we employed to do it say you wrong, and you know very well what it means being at the ‘wrong side’ of the government that is on the wrong side of the law.

One thing that has made us — their patients – lose our patience is the haplessness which is backed up by hopelessness seen from the status quo of 4-month-old nation as reflected in her developmental projects. One of this projects is water supplies. Down from 2006 to-date, Juba should have got piped water if we really meant development. If we do not have that money, then let donors e.g. World Bank lend it, which is recoverable in a short time. For example, in my family, an MP size of our household that you know, we spend an average of over 500 SSP monthly, worse still to the Somalis, Eritreans and Ethiopians who own the water trucks. Can’t this money not bring water to our house every month?

What I am trying to suggest to the Deputy Minister of Interior here is a better solution than his decree of stopping foreigners from supplying water to our people. As we all know, trade is when you buy and sell, but these guys just scoop and sell! Take it this way, how possible is it for a South Sudanese truck driver to scoop water from River Juba (in Somalia) and sell it to the same people who die of water-borne diseases from their own river? So how imaginable is it for a Somali to scoop free water from River Nile and sell it to Juba City in South Sudan?

But then, the solution is not the type of Salva’s Decree (Salva Mathok this time). Instead of letting us spend a day dry like date trees in the Sudanese (Northern) desert, Mr. Deputy Minister should have called for South Sudanese drivers and truck owners, put it this way, privatize and advertize the project so that the mobilization takes place before the Declaration of the Decree. Having mobilized enough Southerners and potential investors for mobile water system in Juba (and also in the other 10 cities), you screen the foreigners without necessarily stopping their business, then phase out their domination politically and politely. Please, police, take not of that word ‘politely’. In that way, we shall not have problems with our new in-laws, the Ethiopians and their belligerent neighbours giving us services in Juba here.

The same thing should be applied to the boda-boda boys. Instead of stopping the boy and ordering me to walk to Juba town on foot, His Excellency should have made sure that all the roads in Juba are operational. And not only that but also all the matatus (mini-buses) are well stationed and well inspected to provide even services to the approximately 90-percent pedestrian population in Juba. In other word, how do I catch my flight from Juba to Wau University if the cyclists are banned from passing through the Mudiriyya roundabout (the one between Juba T. Hospital, Governor’s Office and Juba Hotel)? If you stop me from Juba University roundabout while trying to connect by boda-boda to the Ministries Road through Buluk to Thongpiny, say Airport, how will I reach there, Your Excellency? How will mama cross from Hi-Jallaba to Konyo-Konyo market especially by midday when she is in a hurry to shop food for her sons-in-laws? And so on.

In conclusion, we are independent. And remember please, remember how long we have just forgotten the main slogan that you, sirs, made us sing monotonously amidst your speeches, punctuated with Dr. John Garang’s popular would-you-want-to-become-a-third-class-citizen-in-your-own-country quote. If the biggest population in Juba is being made to walk to work by your decrees, then what will stop us from developping it into an in/famous Uganda’s popular uprising against the government. Ask your friend Mr. Museveni and he will lecture very well what ‘walk to work’ means. Do you want a dose of that, sir? If you don’t then release our boys to take us to Juba Hospital, Airport, Market, Banks, and even ministries, please!

The pretext sugarcoating classism in this Decrees is that they cause accidents. Well, I do agree with that fact which is evidenced by the ‘Boda-Boda Ward” in Juba Hospital, but then, if we want to ill-liminate (‘eliminate’ according to some boss’s pronounciation) accidents totally in Juba, then let’s stop importing cars and motorcycles and begin to walk to work as we used to before and during the war. It’s funny to argue that one hand can clap. Similarly, by stopping cyclists from entering the ‘city centre’ (Mr. Mayor, where is that point?) just because they carry accidents on their backs, it beats one’s understanding why the boys should be out in town with the mission of crushing themselves into the cars of the big people and their children. If not that, then what is the intention of creating a big gap here. Elitism, classism, favouritis, chauvinism, parochialism, and all those -ism terms, methinks, had gone with the Jallaba and the old Sudan. Kumbe, they are still here!

As usual, it would look as contraversial as the decrees themselves to declare this discourse concluded. The conclusion should be a continuation within the reader’s mind and the Juba population, especially the ones that must go to Juba on foot until matatus develop the instincts of going to collect us from the doors of our slums. I will conclude my cititique when all the best roads found in South Sudan, which are actually on the paper, have been transferred from the paper-based project, which paper could either be a Government Master Plan of the Year 2020 or the maps, to the actual gound.

Well, I will have done injustice to me and my readers if I had signed off without mentioning that we will stop contesting and protesting against these decrees only when they are passed by our peoples’ representatives. I will not still appreciate any decree even if I am convinced that that decree is being declared by a person who has a degree in law from Oxford or Harvard.

This, I condemned three years ago in my book, which I will publish when I become rich. This is the poem, one of the 333 making up the anthology, The Black Christs of Africa.

**

Poem 51

**

Punished for being Poor!

**

Try me not;

Cry to Christ:

Who once said,

**

“He that has nothing

Will have his nothing

decreased,

**

He that has something

Will have his something

Increased.”

**

So shall an office messenger

Get poor

For working heated,

**

And shall an office manager

Get more,

For walking seated.

**

To our Hospital of Juba

Drive in and gain,

Walk in and lose;

**

To their Hospital of Cuba,

Walk in and gain,

Drive in and lose.

**

For one to become a candidate

For the World Food Program,

One must first become a candy date

To the world food problem.

**

For, for being poor,

You must be punished,

And for being rich,

You must be furnished.

**

That’s property elevation

Through poverty allegation.

That’s poverty alleviation

Through poverty elevation.

**

Justifying Quote:

A nation trying to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to pull himself up by the handles. Sir Winston Churchill, Former British Prime Minister (journalist, soldier & writer).

 

UN, a bunch of big spectators for the game of sick dictators!

My cattle camp wisdom still tells me that if you cow away from restraining a bull, then you will lose it to the creditor or pay for his vandalism. Similarly, if you shy away from restraining a bully, then you are that bully, yourself; and you will pay for all the mistakes he did, including answering them at the The Hague; during, of course, those days when the UN, the US, the UK, etc. would acknowledge their blunders. Could this be the case between the Sudans and the United Nations?

In Rwanda in 1994, the UN withdrew its soldiers and allowed this to happen! This exactly they have done again by withdrawing from Sudan leaving the genocide to happen along the border states.

And if not the case, then why under the sun could someone leave the condemnable and condemn the condemned, instead? I mean the UN Chief, according to online news, was not happy with the new rebel alliance against El Bashir’s regime, hence condemning the new unity for the Khartoum regime change.  The SPLM-N in both Southern Kordofan and Southern Blue Nile with the Darfur SLMs and JEM teamed up last week to form what they call ‘Sudanese Revolutionary Front (SRF)’.

According to the Sudan Tribune online, “Ban Ki-moon further said he ‘also condemns the reported establishment of a new military alliance of Darfur rebel movements and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North, calling for the use of force against the Government’.”

This word ‘condemn’ is not only condemned by Weakleaks and its author but by other parties angered by the UN’s double standards.

SPLM-N Secretary General and former candidate of the SPLM for Sudan’s presidential election last year, Yasir Arman, said “surprised” and regretted the statement of the UN chief. Arman further said Ban’s statement is supporting ” the aggressors and war criminals” instead of “supporting the victims and the right of the Sudanese people to democracy and the respect for human rights and the rule of law”.

A US based advocacy group, formed by American activists, Sudanese diaspora and a representative of Sudanese rebels, said today that the UN has to condemn Khartoum before because it used to aggress the Sudanese people.  “In condemning the new rebel alliance and calling for more fruitless talks, Secretary General Ban and the United Nations fail to acknowledge both that the government is the primary aggressor in Sudan’s internal conflicts,” said Martina Knee, a spokesperson of Act for Sudan. http://www.sudantribune.com/SPLM-N-regrets-statements-by-UN,40753.

IDPs seeking UN safety from Al Bashir in Abyei last May.

As if that is not enough, the top guy on earth tried (as if) to incite Khartoum against Juba, thus: “The statement indicates fears that attacks against the north by the rebel groups might push the Sudanese army to attack Juba and ignite a new war in South Sudan. The alliance could also lead to a proxy war between the two countries due to the historical links between Sudan People’s Liberation Movement members in the two countries.” http://www.sudantribune.com/UN-chief-condemns-Sudanese-rebels,40733.

Hiii, Big Uncle! Why are you putting such dangerous words in the mouth or mind of the man you know very well? What if you tickle his memory to do it exactly the way you predict it? This is how UN connives with the dictators wielding knives against their own vulnerable people.

When Bashir told your boys to pack and leave to our Southern side of the border, we knew you knelt down to his demands. Otherwise, what was the reason the In/security Council cancelled our Juba proposal that called for UN to spread their peacekeepers, now peace skippers, along the North-South border? That was the solution to our prediction of this so-called proxy war between the north and the south of the split country. How can the US deploy satellite to monitor the movement of the forces on both sides of the border and not the army to do so as we wanted.

Given the death of our African tribes in Abyei, Nuba Mountains (call it Southern Kordofan), Southern Blue Nile, and the so-called Unity State (mine: Dis/unity state) of South Sudan, who is to go to The Hague: Bashir or Ki-moon? It is exactly what they did to Rwanda; taking off at the last minute leaving the vulnerable people to the mercy of bloodthirsty dictators.

Why for God’s sake did they, NATOs, skip Sudan to those countries? Why kill Gaddafi for just bombing rioters and leave Bashir, who not only bombs villagers with Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD)but also bombards the world leaders, including Ki-moon, with words of most distraction (wmd)?

If the UN, US, UK, and all those united sort of… were not big spectators for our sick dictators, then why keep Omar el Bashir, Bashar al Asaad, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, etc. on the necks of the innocent citizens? All I have to say today is questions, questions, questions and questions…

Mr. Ban Ki-moon was first known to South Sudanese as an inciter to Bashir when he hinted in 2009 that the referendum results might lead to war between Khartoum and Juba. Did it happen? I wonder why people whose peoples’ lives lie on their tongues, loosely hold their tongues like that!

We have seen horrible pictures of the bombing of the refugees in South Sudan and IDPs ( I call them Intentionally Displeased Persons) begging for help, but in vain. Why should Bashir intimidate the world, to the extent of bombing an independent country like South Sudan and the world keeps quiet? Maybe, Salva Kiir should revise his oil deals. Could there be something wrong? And if nothing wrong, then why the West watches the bombings and keep their tongues in their cheeks with the words like ‘No-fly zone’?

Pictures of murdered children from the recent bombing of Nuba refugees in Unity State of South Sudan

As far back into our recent history as my mind can take you, the same international aggressor, Mr. Bashir, went as far as bombing Adjumani town of northern Uganda on July 17, 1997 and the ghost association called ‘International Community’ kept mum as usual. Even the Uganda’s Museveni was cowed away from condemning the bombing when Al Bashir gave his blatant statement that he was trying to bomb Nimule but missed the target. How can that Russian-made Antonov bomber miss a target by over 100 kilometres? However, in their Khartoum media, the real intention for bombing Uganda was our present in Adjumani that time. The NIF (National Islamic Front) was trying to bomb the refugees around Adjumani, one of whom was this lucky writer.

Given the background of the 1997 bombing of refugees in Northern Uganda, how im/possible is it for the same regime not/to bomb refugees inside South Sudan. Instead of condemning that bombing with action, the UN Chief condemns it with words, including, not only the rebels alliance in the north, but the Government of the independent south, with those dangerous suggestions of the war between Khartoum and Juba.

I hate certain words which are over-used and misused time and again by such bunch of spectators. In other words, I condemn the term ‘condemn’, itself. What impact is the word condemn to somebody being killed? How does condemn help our refugees from the aerial fiery faeces of Al Bashir’s bombers?

I equally condemn the media gimmick that about 300,000 died in Darfur according to the United Nations. When I was doing my internship with IRIN (Integrated Regional Information Networks) under UNOCHA in Nairobi in 2004, I heard about those estimates. In 2005, the UN came clear of the estimates as 300,000 lives lost in the not-yet genocide in Darfur. Now, see! Since 2005, has nobody died in Darfur? Why keep those figures constant for over 5 years while hundreds are reported to be dying every week. That’s why Bashir also maintains his figures as ONLY 10,000! Hey come on, Mr. Mujahid! Even if it is one person killed, is it not a crime? What is the population that can amount to a crime when killed?

With those figures, it is as if the UN is waiting to reach 800,000 of the Rwanda butchering so that it qualifies to an ethnic cleansing (since they fear mentioning genocide). It is equally as if Bashir is aiming at a certain population higher than ONLY 10,000 for him to accept that it is a crime against humanity and genocide.

Now that the war is being fanned by the likes of the UN Chief between Juba and Khartoum, who then will be the judge if all heavy-weight guys have turned into spectators sitting on the fence? God must help us answer this horror as seen in the picture below.

Can Mr. Ki-moon also condemn this horrible picture of two girls dismembered in the July 27, 2011 aerial bombing of Kurchi village of Nuba Mountains' innocent people

If not God, who also plays the UN game of watching first and condemning later, then the freedom lovers of the world must one day carry out a UN Spring or UN Awakening or UN Uprising. Of course, who next after the ‘Arab Spring’? If the world is really undergoing a true wind of change, then the UN must experience that unless it reforms as soon as possible. I am particular on those so-called Security Council members who sit under one roof and do divergent harm to the world population. Otherwise, what is the point of China wanting oil from South Sudan and giving weapons to Khartoum to pass them over to rebels and militias against the South or against Darfur? If the UN has ears, let them answer these questions or somebody do it for them.

All in all, I repeatedly call for a change in the UN system or somebody will do it for them!

To continue looking at such facts on words and pictures, please click this link and read my previous analysis on the genocide in the Nuba Mountains (Southern Kordofan). http://weakleak.wordpress.com/2011/07/03/my-tears-for-the-sudanese-sarafina/.

 

Is it Religion, Region, Reason or Season that still keeps the Sudans bleeding?!

It is a fact well known that if a country bleeds, the blood must atone for some cause (biblicalists call it sin). But in the case of our country of the past and the present which I now refer to as ‘the Sudans’, the world is still at a loss as to why the flood of blood of innocent people is continuing undammed or undamned. Some analysts and anarchists have constantly pinned the course of our wars, which is the cause of our woes, on the following hypotheses:

"Sudan will never be the same again", Dr. John Garang de Mabior: BEFORE THE SPLIT, THE SUDAN USED TO LOOK LIKE A HEART, BUT THE DIVIDED HEART, WITH LEFT VENTRICAL (the South) SCOOPED OUT AND SOLD OUT (GAMBELLA REGION WHOSE INHABITANTS ARE NOW IN SOUTH SUDAN GOVERNMENT AND THEIR HABITATS IN ETHIOPIA) DURING THOSE SEASONS FOR REASONS BEST KNOWN TO THE REGIONS THAT THINK BY RELIGIONS

THE OLD SOUTH IS GONE, NEVER TO RETURN AGAIN: Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

1- RELIGION

The world media, which is unfortunately copied by our local media, has preached time and again that Sudan civil war is a religious war between the north and the south of the Sudan. They use these phrase, which gathers no praise from patriots like me: ’religious war between the dominantly moslem north and the pre-dominantly Christian and animist south. I protest. There is no religion called animism here in the south. We have our own African religions and then Christianity, which is a pre-dominantly Westernized religion. This also makes me sick to realize that some African have been fanaticized to the extent of believing that I have to pass through a White Man on Earth to access a White Mansion in Heaven. But that is not the topic. The subject matter that has to really matter in this puzzle is ‘But is it a religious war?’. The first answer to be given by the author of the idealogy himself, the Jihad (Islamic) idealoque, Dr. Hassan al Tourabi (in my own words: Dr. Al Trouble). To confirm this, my fellow blogger, Magdi El Gizouli affirms it on his weblog entitled, Still Sudan:

Dr. Hassan Al-Tourabi is now DR. Hassan ALL-TROUBLE because he caused millions of innocent souls being forced to heaven or hell raw.

Turabi, now a victim of the regime, shed off his jihadist credentials and became the ‘sheikh of freedoms’. The believers of the Islamic Movement were shocked twice, once when Bashir humiliated Turabi out of power and gaoled him time and time again, and twice when Turabi ridiculed the jihad years as a mistaken adventure.

I think this confirmation by his former ally will make you believe why I christened him Dr. Al Trouble: ‘Tourabi is the cause of the war with the south and conflict in Darfur and he forced the government (in 1983) to adopt sharia. After Bashir sacked him in 1999, things have been improving and even our relations with neighboring countries have improved,’ says Abdurrhman. He says after Bashir tossed the fierce Islamist leader out, the government moved to make cost of healthcare and education cheaper. Click this link: http://weakleak.wordpress.com/2011/01/19/sorry-uncle-dr-hassan-al-trouble-in-hell-again/

 

The second answer to this is-it-a-religious-war dilemma could best be answered by the latest confession and regrets by a leader of the Egyptian Islamist mercenaries, Al Gama’a al Islamiya founded by Ibrahim Nageb who regrets as follows:

“This participation was a huge mistake that led to what is Sudan’s fate now,” Ibrahim said. The leading figure from al-Gama’a al-Islamiyya suggested that they were misguided in their backing of the war and blamed Bashir’s government for splitting up the country. “The Sudanese regime focused its efforts on Islamizing the south and the Egyptian Islamists considered their participation in the war [was for the cause of] safeguarding Islam.” http://www.sudantribune.com/Egyptian-Islamist-group-admits,40746

Omar al Bashir, saying it all in pictures

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2- REGION

“We order the armed forces to carry on its operations and not to stop until South Kordofan is purged as Abyei was purged before, and Abdel Azizi is arrested and brought to trial,” said Bashir.

Young Nuba girls injured by SAF Antonov cluster bomb near Kadugli on June 27, 2011, in a war of regions.

Now, if we call it a religion, then we are confronted with the fact that the Darfur war is a Muslim against a muslim affair, raising Jesus Christ’s question in reaction to the question of Beelzebul that no devil can fight another devil, ‘Can a house fight itself…?” So it is not a war of religion. And if at all it were, then the 100-percent Muslem Darfur would not bleed. So what war is it now? Maybe a war of region. For instance, Darfur region against central region, Eastern region against central region, Southern region against central region, marginalized regions (areas) against central region, central region against central region…! However, this fact is weakened by the fact that if it were a regional war, then Darfur would not be involved because it has been fighting alongside the central region against the Southern region till 2003. Not only that, but Khartoum (central region) itself has problems within itself. Look at the constant strikes and demonstrations which are crushed by the government forces on daily basis. As if that is not enough, why a series of coup d’ tats since the partial independence of the Sudan in 1956? So if it is not a war of region, then what is the reason? Then it is a war of reason.

3- REASON

The reason here means ideology, rationale, policies, and all that begs a question WHY? Why does somebody declare Jihad on his innocent people, who comprise both Muslim, Christianity and African religions? Why use an apartheid system? Why the ‘kokora’ (divide-and-rule) method? Why…? So what is the reason the Sudan is still bleeding even after the splitting just this season? Maybe the political season.

4- SEASON

It is often attributed to Dr. Martin Luther King, the American civil rights martyr, that he said, “There is nothing powerful than the idea whose time has come.” Therefore, in this season, and for this reason, the time has come for the Arab revolution; in Media terms ‘The Arab Awakening” or “The Arab Spring”, which really intensified during the spring season of this year. The long term political deceipt enveloped in religious fanaticism is now laid threadbare by the forces of liberalism. The wind of change sweeping across north Africa and Arab world is a manifest that the Arab region has seen the reason, democracy the rest of the world is enjoying, and therefore, they want to eat of the fruits thereof, hence the season of change. But this fruit is an Adam’s Apple in the Republic of Sudan, a ‘forbidden fruit’ that can’t be tasted on the streets of Khartoum. So what is making the Sudan, even new one, still bleeding?

Justifications:

A hand of a Sharia victim after the judgment. Most victims to this religious law are the poor, and you know which region they populate.Victims of Sharia who lost their limbs to petty crimes. I would rather they lost their hands in the garden or factory.

 

Should the SPLM/A arrange a funeral or throw a party for the Late Col. Muamar Gaddafi?

Adieu Col. Gaddafi (RIP: Rest in Peace (then), Rust in Pieces)!!!

If we come to matters about the innocence of Col. Muammar Gaddafi (RIP), I would rather we mourn him now for 21 days, then we celebrate his death thereafter. To us in South Sudan (Maybe elsewhere in Africa), he is a blessed-cursed intruder. So if I were a gatekeeper at the Heaven/Hell Junction, I would give him a 21-day long permission chit to Paradise, then an indefinite permission ‘shit’ to Hell thereafter. Why? Learn here or google him on any idea in case you have not been following his craze race around the world.

Col. Gaddafi begs an NTC soldier to forgive him

In Okot P’Bitek’s ’Song of Lawino’, I like this warning: Don’t uproot a pumpkin from an old homestead. Of late, I have not been a fan of the Late Col. Gaddafi. However, who in our African tradition would celebrate and trample over the body of the dead? That was so barbaric of the Libyan rebels. When someone is dead, he is gone and the body becomes that of a human being, like mine and yours and theirs. So why play around with a lifeless body?

Well, that is not the issue now. The issue is should the SPLM/A (call it South Sudanese) celebrate with the West or mourn with the rest? For me, we should do both. Then which one first? Of course in an ascending order, let us mourn him this week, or hereafter, then celebrate his death next week, or thereafter. Why?

One, he helped founded the Republic of South Sudan. Two, he helped sabotaged the founding of the Republic of South Sudan. You see the confusion.

How Col. Gaddafi Helped founded our nation:

Gaddafi's body being mocked by mob justice after the shoot out

In 1983, oil was kilometres deep beneath the soil, and Osama Bin Laden (RIP) was still undergoing training in USA. So the Americans (the Clintons, the Bushes, the Obamas, etc.) had nothing to do with us, genocide or no genocide. The only person who sympathized with us was Col. Muamar Gaddafi. He gave us lots of Kalashnikovs and ,money, and even rented for us a one space office into which Dr. John Garang de Mabior and company crammed the whole government of SPLA/SPLM (including the ministries of today). That office and the airtime of 3.00PM hired from the Mengistu Haille Mariam’s radio (both in Addis) made the nucleus of our today’s Republic.

Gaddafi’s words: “South Sudan I had my own opinion on it since a very long time ago and the days of Joseph Lagu and days of Garang [late SPLM chief]” Gaddafi was quoted by the official Libyan official news agency (JANA). “It [South Sudan] was in reality attached and became part of Sudan due to the colonial divisions that we talked about. Colonialism created a new map and new people according to its interests and wherever its armies reached,” he added.

“I told them my brothers that even if you secede I will support your independence. Why? Because you don’t speak Arabic; your language is English and your language is local. Your religion is not Islam; you are animists and some of you are Christians. You are from another side not from Sudan, different from Darfur and Nubia and East Sudan and Khartoum,” Gaddafi said.

God bless Col. Muamar Gaddafi! Amen!

How Gaddafi almost stopped our baby nation from being born

'Cockroaches and Rats smoking out Gaddafi from their own holes as one 'cockroach is preparing a gas

You see, that is why I wrote on my blog above like this: “In fact, I really enjoy politics; but when some wannabes play poly-tricks, i would rather I were their hangman!” So when Gaddafi turned round to abort us just one year to our political maternity, I had no problem participating in slashing off one of his ears like Simon Peter, the Disciple did to one of Jesus’s Judases. Now. I am one of the guys that can enjoy the feast for bye-byeing Col. Gaddafi in Bilpam (Juba) should the SPLA spend some millions in celebrating his going.

This is what Gaddafi said about our independence just a few months after saying the above statements and a days to our freedom. “You will be a very weak state and you will need someone to support you from outside and you will be colonized either by the US, China or Europe…or Israelis” he said.

“Whoever that will colonize you will oppress you and take your wealth and lie to you telling you that he will help you and your independence and that you are newborn state,” Gaddafi added.

Gaddafi said that since this is South Sudan “destiny” then he recommends that they remain with united Sudan saying it is better than being independent “under the protection of other imperialist or Zionist powers. Click here for full story. “http://www.sudantribune.com/Libyan-leader-says-independent,32235

Gaddafi told South Sudan in 2009: You'll be a very weak nation and foreigners will enjoy your country

Poor Prophet of Doom that only saw a speck in South Sudan’s eye and left a log in his Libyan eye, now that we are independent, and not only that but also able to rule ourselves unlike his Libya, who will condemn me if I throw a party to say Fare thee well Muamar Gaddafi! Bashir and the company of African leaders who want to be Kings of Kings of Africa, watch out! And watch this space for news about your funeral or farewell ceremony.

For your further reading, click this link to find out who had joined Gaddafi, Bashir, Derby, Aferweki, Ping, Ki-moon, etc. in trying to postpone our referendum last time. http://www.newsudanvision.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2124:how-political-prostitution-might-cost-south-sudanese-their-hard-earned-freedom&Itemid=14

God blast Gaddafi!

This poem from my other upcoming book “The Jongley Jongleur & Other Pennets” was written two months ago before Gaddafi met his predicted end. Look at it carefully….

The Tripling Trip to Tripoli

“Crush them!”

AK47 rattles: rat-a-tat-tat!

Gaddafi then smells the rat

As the battalions of the roaches

Begin to declare their approaches

He gropes the way to the holes of the moles

while the coalition swaps with him the roles

Which aren’t any longer sweet

‘Zenga Zenga: street by street,

From House to house:

And mouse to mouse,

Catch them!

 

A Cry of the Youth of the South: Save us from Inverted Investors!

This is an Open Appeal to General Assembly and General Public of the Republic of South Sudan.

By inverted investors here, I do not intend in any way or by any means to aggress our noble development partners in all sectors of our virgin economy, and in all factors of our maiden autonomy, with which they are helping our ‘baby nation’ to stand on its feet. I am breaking my long silence in media commentaries this time in response to the affairs affecting our poverty-daunted public in the war-haunted Republic. Otherwise, another
title of this piece could be ‘To Whom It May Concern’. And if it is you, be it you, then.

The ‘you’ I mean here should not be owned anyhow. Take it or leave it this way. If you are one of the ‘investors’

FROM PAIN TO GAIN, THEN BACK TO PAIN AGAIN! (This young South Sudanese man screamed with joy on July 9 but may scream with pain if all the expectations that came with the independence are allowed to be met by foreign youths who did not cast a ballot, did not release a bullet or did not lose a relative to realize this freedom.) Photo by John Penn de Ngong.

who come without money and go with our money, or if you come along with your office sweepers, drivers, cooks, cashiers, secretaries and the like, there you are. For instance, the one that dragged me into this open gossip came alone from Khartoum or early from South Korea through places of that kind. Seeing the many potholes and loopholes in our legal defence system, he then imported a former pyramid tourists guide from
Egypt whom he trained, and then forged for him a driving licence in Juba overnight, only to be squarely placed on us as a driver, an accountant, an administrator, and so on to manage over 10 South Sudanese youth in a vast media business that we later lost to his boss who kept on telling us, “I like this boy because he ‘foolishly follows’ my orders.” Whatever that means.

I am writing angrily to ‘fake foreign investors’, or those who are doing the opposite of investment, because I have been repeatedly subjected to embarrassment, harassment, cheating, beating…and other abuses still counting in my experiences with foreigners both inside and outside South Sudan. Let note not be taken here for granted. So take it in a way that if I say ‘I’ or ‘me’, I mean we or us. Who? South Sudanese youth. Why only the youth? I am telling you right now how. Like an inverted market where futures (later date stocks) tend to have lower prices than in the current market, our ‘inverted investors’, in my own terms, are those hit-and-run miracle profit hunters. They do not give a damn about the future of our country. By the way, by the future, I mean the youth.

In order not to hurt every innocent reader, leader, worker or investor of foreign background in South Sudan, let me narrow this huge concern down to a case study of which I am a victim. I am reacting to my former partner, the publisher of the South Sudan Business Review magazine, Mr. Kim Kee Choon and company unlimited. By using a title ‘publisher’ that he chose for himself, my readers should not imagine a huge publishing house or printing company in Juba. This is the man who ventured into ‘publishing’ beginning with my one and only desktop printer, an HP Deskjet 2050 series, in a hotel room in March 20011, which, together with all our business ideas, remained with him after twisting our laws and arm-twisting our leaders to our disadvantage.

You know, if you keep on poking someone or something every time, even if it is a dead chicken, your stick will turn it round one time. That, exactly, is what Mr. Kim has done to me and my former colleagues of the said magazine. However, my interest in writing this response to his series of editorial and dictatorial articles in the previous issues of the magazine, some of them web-based while others rumour-based, some not published while others are yet to be published, is his unprofessional campaign against my nation, not necessarily against my person.

Mr. Kim’s intention to belittle a South Sudanese as an individual and South Sudan as a nation in an invention that is now threadbare bears threat in the following instances. In the August/September issue (2011) of the magazine, he wrote an editorial message that does not only insinuate weakness on me as one of the first few South Sudanese journalists with about 10 years of media experience, but also on South Sudan as an independent entity on the ladder of building its international membership and diplomatic image. Since the retired
general-in-South-Korea-turned-journalist-in-South-Sudan took the defamation to the public arena, so do I here in an attempt to correct my peoples’ image in general and my image in particular.

Firstly, it is a fact well known that in our South Sudanese (as in other African) societies; it is not only a national abomination but also a natural taboo to talk ill of the dead people, even if they were your enemies. Therefore, I am provoked by the misplaced history published in the July and maiden edition of the South Sudan Business Review (Pages 8 – 14) distorting our noble cause of liberation struggle and retorting to the contribution of our
gallant heroes. I respond in such a way upon Mr. Publisher’s attempt to play around with the grave error that deserves a serious apology, if not a series of apologies. Calling the following deliberate blunder ‘a few spelling mistakes’ makes the insincere apology even null and void and a mere public relations gimmick to hide his greed for profits through the sale of a crude material such as this, which, according to real journalistic ethics or laws, could have resulted in the withdrawal of the printed paper from public consumption; that is when it misses punitive measures.

A young man raising his hand as high as the South Sudan flag which this photographer (John Penn) shot against the V(ictory)-sign on July 9, 2011

Mr. Publisher, I wonder if you do honestly mean to play down those seven picturesque pages of military uniform and military hardware dotting a volume of hard words as typo or a spelling error that begins with an attention-catching statement.  “There is something of a cult surrounding Garang here.” And on the following page as on any other of the seven pages, the writer, who had promised in the first paragraph to ‘add some flavor to the story’, continues accusing the hero and his people like this.  ”The SPLA was mainly an army to defend Dinka and Nuer interests, the largest tribes here in South Sudan. Garang was a god for many of his followers, but was a ‘little’ authoritarian with his own people: this caused a faction of the SPLA to rebel against their leader. The Nuers, guided by Gen. Riek, formed their SPLA-United group, and massacred 2,000 Dinkas in the town of Bor, while displacing 100,000 people. Riek made a deal with the Sudanese government, receiving lots of money and arms…” I guess the general referred to therein is Dr. Riek Machar whose name is also misspelled as Machal on the cover page and whose rank of a general was non-existent by the year 1991 AD. Similarly, I thought the SPLM-United group was under Dr. Lam Akol as an offshoot from the Nasir Faction.

Whereas it was not ethical for a business review to turn into a history review, it was equally not called for to write about such things and distribute them to our guests as if to change their opinion about us on our Independence Day. In addition, the figures and facts given have not been attributed to any source, hence misleading and inciting at a time of our nation healing and nation building. Having reacted to the history review in the Independence Issue of the business review, I have more problems with the negative campaign by Mr. Kim on the current August/September issue, especially in his editorial message,is carrying out thus.

 ”However, I would like to ask of my South Sudanese friends. Are we foreigner-friendly?” Before we say yes or no, Mr. ‘Publisher’ concluded for the readers: “Surprisingly,many foreign friends whether they are here for humanitarian support activities or for tapping the possibility to invest, do not agree South Sudanese in general are foreigner-friendly or investment-friendly although the government promises to make this country as an investment destination of choice.”

With the level of language and journalism I know, I believe some foreign youth christened ‘editor’ wrote this for him, and I bet the young man will still be disappointed by his boss sooner than later. One factor Mr. Kim has to
know through his ghostwriter is that he is misdirecting the foreigners here and victimizing the Southerners who are said to be “…in general…not foreigner-friendly and investment-friendly”. The ‘publisher’ who is not, according to media norms, supposed to write an editorial did not carry out a survey to convince us of his sources of information. Like in the above historical assumptions, no reference to a survey or concrete evidence indicating that we are generally not friendly to our own investment or investors, nor  our foreign friends generally not agreeing with our hospitability to accommodate foreigners. I thought Mr. Kim should mind his business of winning more contracts and big friends and leave us to criticize our own government if need be.

Another factor this ‘media investor’ and his crew should know is that we still have fresh memories of how we, their former foreigners now their hosts, were treated in their own countries (Egypt, Kenya, Uganda, etc.). For instance, our senior Sudanese staff of The Sudan Mirror newspaper were arrested and harassed in Nairobi in 2004, while we, juniors were doing the daily round with the police. One of the prisoners I am talking about, Gwado Joseph Ador, is now a director of research in the Ministry of Information. Reasons? Working in Kenya without work permits, regardless of the fact that we were producing the paper of, for, and by South Sudanese, which was mainly not sold there but sent back to Sudan wholesale.

When we shifted to Kampala as a result of such persecutions, a similar but more dangerous ordeal was the kidnapping in 2006, and stabbing with a knife in 2007, of a South Sudanese newspaper editor in Kampala. Who was that? This very writer! And I believe, by that time, our current substitutes were still in their institutes or secondary schools in their home countries; with no dream whatsoever to come and replace some ‘uneducated’ South Sudanese one day. The solution to the media control battle we fought in East Africa can now be seen in the ownership and staffing of the two papers: The Sudan Mirror and The Southern Eye, now seemingly Kenyan and Ugandan properties, respectively, in South Sudan. Here, I leave more spaces for testimonies from Khartoum, Cairo, as well as Seoul, if at all we have any South Sudanese investor there. As Mr. Publisher keeps on comparing South Korea with South Sudan, I bet, the only feature in common is the geographical adjective, ‘South’. So who is more foreigner-friendly now, South Sudan or those countries whose media laws would either close down or nationalize a foreign-run media house? And it should be noted that Mr. Kim is running this business under his sole foreign proprietorship and foreign employment, and at his comfort of writing such statements against our search for a complete independence.

In the same editorial, the publisher contradicted himself again by adding, “The Government says we welcome visitors even if they do not have visas.” He also added fuel to fire by asking our immigration department to issue visas by faxing or e-mailing them to visitors in their respective countries before they book their flights to South Sudan, since we do not have embassies there. You see! Which country in this world could open its borders to visitors even without visas and vend or send its visas out there to whom it may concern? And this investor is right, given the fact that if you call any of the street idlers, hawkers, boda-boda riders (I call them border-to-border raiders), matatu drivers, waitresses, managers and the like, to produce a visa or travel document, not to mention a work permit, you will fill up all your prisons with inmates of the same crime.

And should you do that, you will face huge demonstrations from such drivers as seen with Ugandans on our roads a few weeks ago, which demonstrations if we, the robbed youths of the land, try, will be labeled gangsters or hooligans as Mr. Publisher reported to his big friends during our feuds. The only survival trait for such rights-grabbers is that our law enforcers (the big ones) have swallowed our laws, and then in turn are swallowed by such investors wholesale. If I seem to exaggerate this, then just touch one of the petrol station Somalis and you will see a police siren at a breakneck speed to the scene. Ask my colleague, Maal Maker, in case of any doubt.

By the way, does Mr. Publisher of the South Sudan Business Review know that a native can hang in Asia for just stealing large amount of money, leave alone a foreign investor taking with him a money-minting machine for investing in Korea or China? Has he ever heard of the 10 Ugandans sentenced to death for dealing in something that looks like in drugs in China? I would rather there was enough reason to hang those West and East African criminals who have been caught red-handed with raw materials, including mobile mints, for manufacturing our new currency and dollars. I think what Mr. Kim is doing to us is not fair and also not far from what a certain company just did in Europe: declaring South Sudan No. 5 on the index of the terrorist-friendly countries of the world, despite the fact that no single bomb has ever exploded in Juba, where Al Shabaab, Al Qaeda, LRA, name them, could just enter ‘even without visas’!

In fact, if the government, whichever department, has really announced such an open-door or no-visa policy to the whole world in a bid to make us foreigner-friendly, then I ask that our government of the Republic of South
Sudan be taken for a refresher course on diplomacy in the Republic of South Korea. But with the publisher’s absurdity as seen in his self-given title, ‘Voluntary Advisor to South Sudan Government’ as he addresses himself, (see July Issue, page 49 of the magazine: Letter to the President), there is enough room for doubting the authenticity of the three sources, namely: the quote, the quoter and the quoted, which applies throughout the entire magazine’s production.

If anyone seems to dispute that this man is not a prophet of doom to the young nation, then here is another editorial message, which failed to reach our streets, thanks to our court threats by the time he wrote this. “Now, we understand that it is not easy to overcome these tribal and provincial conflicts in South Sudan. If we do not know how to concede for the benefits of others, then now one will sacrifice for own benefits. If everyone insists on their interests without taking care of others, every tribe and state, then there will be no guarantee for mutual progress and development.”

And Mr. Voluntary Advisor continued prophesying,”If we are to spend other years overcoming this internal crisis after a long time of struggling with the North, we shall be hopeless. If we, the Southern Sudanese do not
overcome the problems of tribalism and provincialism in the shortest time, then we would go back to the bush again as in the decades before.” This time, he is using the pronoun ‘we’ for reasons best known to him.

Maybe one simple reason to make us accept the next apology from Mr. Publisher (I would rather he were Mr. Editor), who wrote the recent editorial as an apology for the first issue, is sympathy on condition of his lacking
media knowledge, the only reason most of our media companies are getting away with crimes here in South Sudan. God, let there be media law! Is it possible for a retired army general in South Sudan to become a media general (general publisher, general editor, general journalist, general advisor, general investor, etc.) in South Korea? This is what Mr. Kim is all about, no wonder he ‘writes’ such statements.

With the media freedom he acquainted and journalism knowledge he updated himself with in Khartoum where he spent his last 15 years doing business, and where the marketing manager of his magazine (see his editorial team) sits directing issues of Juba by remote control from Khartoum like an SPLM-DC chairman. You can imagine how many apologies Mr. Voluntary Advisor is yet to offer South Sudanese as long as he continues clinging on the sumptuous title of ‘The Publisher’ or something of that kind in this country where titles have made people lame in the names. My modest call to Mr. Kim here is if he does not want such reactions against him in the next issue(s) of the ‘Business Review’, then let him leave the work to the editor, if at all the current editor will still be enjoying his job in the few months to come.

A dummy copy of President Kiir's RSS National ID Card No. 000001 held against the cameras by the author after the Independence Declaration on July 9, at Dr. Garang Mausoleum

Thirdly, in this same apology, he writes thus against me (and myn colleagues), “Throughout five months of preparation time of the first edition, we experienced various disgraceful setbacks; of conflicts, and even legal litigation because of the misgivings and misunderstanding in ways of thinking, living and working between myself with 60 years of multi-national background and my South Sudanese wanted-to-be partner at that time. On this occasion of the holy atmosphere of the independence, I would like to suggest to all my South Sudanese comrades, friends, and would-be-partners to try to understand and learn the ways of thinking and working from many foreign friends, visitors, and investors who will be flowing into the new Republic.”

From this long quote, I warn Kim’s editor or ghostwriter to mind his sensitively insinuating, if not insulting, words such as ‘wanted-to-be partner, ways of thinking, ways of living,’ etc.  Mindless of the fact that it is the foreigners who are supposed learn the ways of the locals, I wonder if Mr. Kim, with all his 60-year background as a multi-national broker in Korea, America, Saudia Arabia, Khartoum and now Juba, can still remember the day and the way, in that ill-fated February of our first meeting, he came hunting for me while I was working on my magazine in Juba Grand Hotel, requesting me to help him ghostwrite a book on South Sudan history, then later shifted to
joining me as a partner in the magazines. I mean The Younique Generation magazine, which was entering a local partnership with South Sudan Business Week of Mr. Deng Ayok, the first victim of Mr. Kim from whose idea of the magazine’s name was plagiarized thereafter.

 After I had spent three intensive months researching and developing the market strategies and editorial policies
of our media business in the proposed name of Business Information Bureau of South Sudan (BIBOSS), into which we intended to enter a public-private partnership with our government, he illegally locked out 10 South Sudanese nationals who are still with the company ID cards to date. These include me, the then local partner and Managing Editor, my deputy, Maal Maker Thiong, and many others. “Whoever supports John Penn should now go with him,” the old general declared by the time we were opening our new centre funded by him. So all
the South Sudanese who were employed through me got expelled, except only one blackleg who had begged me for a job and whom the racial boss previously showered with praises for possessing by coincidence a semblance of South Korean name and North American background. This ‘lost boy’ is still assigned to report
on our daily plans by stealth, and there is likelihood that he would earn himself a permanent bed in the old man’s abode soon, if not already in by now. Lest I forget, somebody please, tell Mr. Publisher to tell his ‘Administrator’ to clear the staff accommodation bills from the previous hotel that he deserted without farewell or telling his next destination.

On seeing the sample copy of the first paper, Mr. Kim secretly took it, hired a local guide to the Ministries of Information and Legal Affairs of the time, and registered it on sole proprietorship, claiming to have incorporated it under his company that came with him from Khartoum or China. He threatened us with one ‘big man’ in the Ministry of Interior (Police) whom he claimed to be his partner, and who later denied to be a beneficiary of the magazine. What beats our mis/understanding is how he succeeded in convincing our law to register the magazine alone without a local partner in the field of media, and especially when the same department of Registrar of Companies had just postponed  our move to register this company, on an excuse that the registration exercise was suspended from the month of May till after the independence declaration. By a well un/known miracle that he might have performed, Mr. Kim managed to undo our laws and registered himself into
the magazine in a matter of hours, just as he has been doing with other mega and sensitive contracts such as the passports deal (now an ordeal) and police uniform supplies he ‘won’ before! Don’t ask me but him, Kim, how he protects our such classified information from being seen in or by Khartoum, where his business general manager sits and operates.

What also pains us to let me react hereby is the incessant cries of the South Sudanese young men and women he cheated, whom he is now still teasing in public, and who are still jobless and hunting for their rights robbed using the name of our big people who have nothing to do with this business and nothing to offer us in compensation. As if that is not enough, another humiliation is the replacement of all South Sudanese journalists with 100-percent foreigners, now listed as editorial team (see the magazine), but whose real qualifications are nothing short of drivers, some of whom we trained here in Juba, designers, watchmen and the like, of the Egyptian, Ugandan and Kenyan origins.

These friends of ours do acknowledge the fact and shed us crocodile tears for the broad daylight robbery, but are forced by money and conditions to ‘Google’ for South Sudanese their news and history and ghostwrite editorials for the South Korean in that manager. To add salt to our wounds, our readers and leaders pay their hard-earned pounds to fund an insult by buying but keeping it in their drawers intact, as if to fulfill the old colonial adage on African illiteracy: “If you want to hide a treasure (an abuse this time) from an African, keep it in a book.”

For this and other reasons, I am obliged not only to react in defence of our dignity but also to call upon members of the public, lawmakers, law enforcers and law-breakers, Mr. Publisher included, to effect a change in our legal system of co-existence with our foreign friends, especially the ones who come with nothing but leave with something. Your Excellencies, let there be a difference between investors and traders. For instance, we are the traders, foreigners are the investors who will in turn partner with us or supply us with lacking goods and services from their countries. This is worth doing speedily if we wanted to stop the youths of South Sudan from repeating the South Africa’s embarrassing situation of xenophobia.

Xenophobia, a resultant fear or hatred developed against foreigners on economic, racial, social and colonial classism, is due to the experience we are getting from our own police and courts of law which are arm-twisted by foreign dealers. For instance, when we reported the case to the police, it took them two weeks to summon the accused, only for our complaints to end up in a Malakia Police mock court, “Your case is dismissed!” declared somebody in the name of a lawyer or judge introduced to us as ‘something’-nihaba. The case died when one big man (or two), whose names and powers Mr. Publisher is wielding here and there to penetrate both private and public walls in Juba, was invoked. Your Excellency, please take note here!

From the journalistic point of view, I am also advising Mr. General Advisor to be careful with whoever he is gathering his stories with and from, keeping in mind that not even a single foreign prophet in the name of a journalist, an editor or a publisher can claim to tell us better our own history. It is impossible for self-ordained clique of expats and experts in the field of local information, especially non-researchers, to come and tell the history makers (us), how we made our own history last time in 1991 or 2005. He should also get guided that jumping here and there in search of a local partner among the daughters and sons of the big people of this country, as I am told of late, is no solution, yet, to replace me. In our times, things will never be the same
again. The fact that these children have money deposited for them in bank accounts does not mean that they have every knowledge installed in their brain accounts.

As for my media friends, who come from other countries, or resort to media after jumping here and there and failing this and that in South Sudan, journalism as a career or editing as a task is not just a matter of knowing
English language fluently or a design program influentially. It is knowing much more than just gathering bookish knowledge or ‘Googling’ internet politics, history, civics, geography, language, and everything of these people. Just as you update your computer anti-virus daily, please, update your anti-litigation if you want to sell to us our own history, politics, economics, and the aforementioned topics, which had for decades been distorted by our outgoing colonial masters.

H.E. Daniel Toroitich arap Moi, former president of Kenya and Rtd. Gen. Lazarus Sumbeiwo, celebrating with us on July 9, one of the examples of the best partners/investors that this country needs. The two men brokered the CPA that brought about our Independence! (Photo by John Penn de Ngong)

And as for all investors in South Sudan, we understand an investor as somebody who comes with his money with the aim of increasing it using our local resources. The resources, being both human and natural in this country, any ‘investor’ who does not want to develop the human resource first, which is the tools for them to use in exploiting our gold, soil and oil, is that ‘inverted investor’. They are quick but quack investors, the ones for whom I am calling upon our General Assembly and general public to save us from.

To cut the unending story short, ‘to save us from’ means from their economic, political, social, psychological and physical abuses, one of the reasons that kept me quarantined in Juba here. It is a long story again but in one sentence. When we developed loggerheads with our East African hosts (governments and communities), there was apparently a legal attempt to get rid of foreigners trying to work there, by all means, including kidnapping and stabbing, both of which I suffered twice between The Sudan Mirror (in Kenya) and The Southern Eye
(in Uganda). Now that I have run to my country for the very refuge that I had gone to look for in East Africa, I do not want to hear again that some suspiciously looking persons had come to ask for my room number or phone number like the ones I was told during the said legal suit two months ago. Otherwise, it is worth repeating here that after the ambiguous results of the police ‘mock court’, I had promised my partner to use my citizenship logic against his money magic.

And I wish I were an investor in South Sudan to put in my notebook this: quoting myself, “To avoid the description of an inverted investor; in other words, to save for the future here is to make more friends with the youth, the leaders of tomorrow, than with the elders, the leaders of today. Otherwise, what is the meaning of establishing a media investment while you make enemies with the ministers and directors of information of the year 2020, 2030 or 2050?”

The writer is the deposed Managing Editor of South Sudan Business Review magazine, The Younique Magazine (his current magazine), a poet, an essayist, a blogger at www.weakleak.wordpress.com and an online columnist under the title ‘Thinking Anti-clockwise’ at www.newsudanvision.com. E-mail: penndengong@gmail.com

NB: All the views expressed in the article therein are in line not with the publishing website or paper but with the interests of the unfairly dismissed South Sudanese workers of South Sudan Business Review, and similar individuals or groups among the largely jobless youths of the Republic of South Sudan.

 

BRIBALISM: a hybrid hype and type of corruption born with the Reap-public of South Sudan!

SHUT UP B4 U R SHUT DOWN! Corruption is a contagious disease that makes a mouth (an eating organ) cancerously grow anyhow, anywhere, everywhere, anytime and even everytime in any part of our societies (bodies). So dear fellow youth of the South, be careful how you raise your hands up against this d/evil, lest they copy and paste one big mouth on your criticizing palm so that (I quote), "YOUNG BOY, SHUT UP BEFORE YOU'RE SHUT DOWN!", warned one big uncle to me 2 years ago.

Let me have you told, with corruption, I have no monkey business with its definition. In fact, as a nation is born, a new notion is born, born with new terms, new styles of providing services: i.e. services through novices. As you move here and there, you would see a lot of money going on monkey businesses headed by manky monkeys driving on lanky donkeys.

Bravo our ‘Baby Nation’! Born with a lot of stuff, including versatile oil and fertile soil, which are spoiled under not toil. The two, that are rarely found in any country are found in ours; with the soil suspending on the lake of oil, we are yet set to see more miracle millionaires. Yes, through corruption, corrupiopn in a brand new hybrid fornm— very typical of us. What is it

Bribalism! Like many viruses mingled with anti-viruses over a generation ago, we are now implicated in the most complicated form of a virus: HIV, and its offspring, Aids! I mean Bribalism, which  is a simple math of tribalism blended with bribery.

Arithmetically speaking, it is Tribalism  + Bribery = Bribalism.

How the stuff works. Bribalism is born like this. A leader ascends a ladder through s/election, and is given all keys to appoint their relatives, friends or acquaintances (the recommended ones), hence disappoints the rests,
among them me! These platoons of kin and kith come along with their businesses: one type a monkey business in the government office and another type a money business in the company office. Yeah, when they ‘win’ contracts, the underlying objective is not to supply dura to save the hungry people who would vote them in tomorrow. Rather this way, it is to design stamps and stamp some photoshopped stuffs: ‘paid’ or ‘delivered’. Then, instead, the quick cash is used now to buy beers and daily meals to buy votes from the starving sods. If not that, then this.

You appoint more tribeswo/men who get access to wealth, then you tell them to sing you songs of a hero type by means of a positive stereotype. By such numbers in public places, you now bribe your tribe into washing you, even if it means attacking prisons to break you out or writing ‘Letters to the President’ through our copy-and-paste media, or sending a delegation of elders with a bunch of allegations against Camp B. Through this and many other ways not mentioned here, bribalism is born out of bribery and tribalism. Yes, I have seen already the new (‘new’ means recycled in SS) brooms are even getting the bug at its preliminary stage that I can now call
‘try-balism’. They try it out with trivialism, say, with petty petty deals which do not amount to corruption, yet. Yet that is how it grows. And even if they amount, then, they are marred by mega deals or barred by mega dealers.

I hear they are being forced to show how they got their buildings, cars and petrol stations. Over their bodies, who do you bet will dare to declare? Even if one hare had to dare and volunteer to declare bare all her or his belongings, right from the air fare, they will play the usual cowboy trick, and win the game, and get away with the goal by a hat trick as usual from the ‘Auntie Corruption Commission’. I tell you, some of them have mastered this political soccer like Manchester United. They need a new team teeming with new rules, and even rename them ‘Man-chaser United’ Commission against this Men-chests-are-United Club.

“I am committed to setting a new standard for transparency and accountability in our public finances and in setting a new standard for public officials. Beyond the 100 day action already launched, I will take five critical steps as a visible sign of the new government’s commitment.”

Back to the open rumour, which is no humour to both of us, the cheats and the cheated. I hear they will be forced to declare their wealth. I bet by my health, it is as im/possible as requesting you to declare your other parts!  But our Big Man has chosen to execute it in this way as the baton was passed behind to be taken to the finishing point by his First Runner up against his firsts ‘runners down’, as read on y/our government rediffusion set (call it SSTV) a few days ago, thus.

“We will enforce the obligation of all public officials to publish their income and financial assets. We will provide an opportunity of an anonymous return account for civil servants and public officials to return any diverted funds, obligating them to publish their assets from the date of independence,” he (the president) added.

Well, I am beaten to pulp my the mis/interpretation of this statement, except the phrase with the ‘date’. Ati… ‘from the date of independence’! That’s how much wealth accumulated just within 74 days? How
about from the date of CPA, sir? Unless His Excellency is talking about the other brewing biggest scandal of the year, the 94 million SSG for Independence Celebration! Ssssh, it’s supposed to be whispered, for we the porters or the supporters of the celebration day have not even received our donkey salaries, yet. Some small man, taken from us to sit among the Bigs is ever saying (on phone as usual since such phoney issues are not discussed in meetings), “Ssssh, they’ve not released they workers’ arrears, yet!”  Yes, and we are supposed to believe it like ‘Islam’ till we realize it when the keys can no longer unlock the door to the paradise.

As for big contractors to local contractors, I have no comment today, especially on the Dura Deals, the Maize Maze, and other mega deals that left us seeing with our mouths instead. But I can only leave it not without a comment from the big secretary of the money ministry.

Our parents used to tell us, "Don't bite what you cannot swallow!" Could this be the case why our government is investing in foreign firms, which come with nothing but go with something?

“It’s a real concern for us and we would like to see more money paid to local contractors to contribute to economic growth,” Salva Garang Mabiordit, Undersecretary in the Ministry of Finance and
Economic Planning, told Sudan Tribune on Tuesday.

Well, what matters is not the capacity of the local companies, but the legality. Some turn out be ghosts created from within the very ministry. Let’s wait and see from the Ramciel deals. But first serve your eyes with Central governor’s contradiction on the mode of contraction, the old notion that ‘you are not able to govern yourselves’.

“The government has always wanted to assist local contractors but the problem has always been with local contractor themselves. Only very few can afford to undertake huge developmental projects. Most of the time the government tries to contact local contractors before so as to see how we could help you join forces and take part of the big projects,” said Wani responding to allegations from local contractors who said they were being sidelined.

Dear reader, there is more space left here for the next critique, which is to look into “The Pillars and Caterpillars (Advantages and Disadvantages) of Corruption“.

Finally, you know why I cannot define this thing here. It should be defined by all of us (because from our experience, once one gains, the other pains). In my poetry book, I just describe it, but first answer this Opinion Poll….

Poem 74

It Should Be Defined           

It should be defined

It shouldn’t be refined

It shouldn’t be divined.

It erupts,

It disrupts,

It interrupts;

Like pregnancy

In its stagnancy,

Its malignancy

Is the enemy

Of our economy,

Of our autonomy.

Bulging like anthill,

It takes us uphill

And makes us ill.

It’s a dis-ease,

A deadly disease,

Of no cease for decease.

An ulcer,

A cancer,

A canker…

Relevant Quote

“We have a cancer within, close to the Presidency, that is growing. It is growing daily.”  John
Dean (1938 – ) U.S. presidential counsel, 1973.  From a taped conversation with the president, Richard Nixon. Referring to the Watergate Scandal.

 

Our Communities: From Killing to Healing, then back to Killing…

One of the submachine guns used in our 'battle of cattle' rebellion against the public of the Republic South Sudan!

I am dismayed. We did not expect this! How come our communities, who fought the civil war, which brought them all the civic woes, are still dying in numbers greater than those during the real conflict? This cycle of strife is definitely fitting and befitting the description of the post-revolutionary period in Russia (former USSR) in a book called ‘Darkness at Noon’ by my favourite novelist, Arthur Koestler:

“We seem to be faced with a pendulum movement in history, swinging from absolutism to democracy, from democracy back to absolute dictatorship.”

If it does not fit that, then it must not fit this:

“The only defence is in offence, which means that you have to kill more women and children more quickly than the enemy if you want to save yourselves”. (Stanley Baldwin (1867 - 1947), British prime minister. Hansard, Speech.

This, in other words, means our people who thought were now liberated enough are being dragged back to absolute annihilation. It is pathetic to see our leaders classifying death caused by their enemy within (weakness) to that caused by still our enemy without (somewhere in Khartoum). Now, not after Independence!

If we could allow the so-called northern enemy to arm and rearm our tribes by proxy, then why for God’s sake did someone declare us independent? If we know and confess that over 1,000 children and women could die in one week, then why for goodness sake does somebody try to convince us that it’s a ‘cattle battle’? If about 400 could silently die of hunger/disease in one village, then why call it ‘death from an unknown disease’? Where on earth (if not in Warrap) is there a disease which is wrapped up in myth or mystery?  For me, I think it is hunger which is wrapped up, say, ‘warrapped up’ into a malaria or cholera of the sort.

I think, in Jonglei, it is Athor’s war that is ‘jongleyed up’ into a battle for cattle by the Murle or Lou as the Jongleyans’ Hon. Speaker Chol Wal put it through Sudan Tribune like this, “He said the rebel leader is now operating in Nyirol and Uror counties, which is complicating the civilian disarmament process underway there. The speaker said Athor, a former senior military general and minister in South Sudan, was aiming to tarnish the peaceful co-existence among Jonglei’s communities.”

But these guys will never ever stop contradicting themselves or opposing one another just for the sake of doing it. Of course, former friends of Khartoumers! The reporter of the Sudan Tribune quoted another one, “In a separate interview with Uror County commissioner in Bor, Tut Puok Nyang denied the presence of rebels in his county and dismissed the claims that Athor was rearming young men in the area, calling it a baseless lie”.

Lou-Nuer 'Cattle raiders' returning from Murle on May 11, 2011. Photo by John Penn de Ngong at Akobo Airstrip.

Ok, Your Ex-cellency, if you call it a ‘baseless lie’ (I dread this word ‘baseless’ly borrowed from SAF spokesman), how about this one which I got from the real base of the information? The Lou-Nuer Paramount Chief, Gatluak Thoar, told me this in Yuai (Uror County headquarters) in May, “We all surrendered our guns to the government last year. The youth who have guns today did not survive the disarmament, but were re-armed by George Athor.” The same was echoed by several speakers in Uror, Akobo, Nyirol and Duk counties.

For your full briefingd and debriefing, click this document that I prepared with my fellow daredevils who toured the Jonglei Conflict Triangle in April, May and June this year. It is on my blog: Pages 13 through 34 of the whole PDF report. http://weakleak.files.wordpress.com/2011/06/peace-assessment-report.pdf

If our leaders think it is a slight thing that is happening in Greater Upper Nile and Warrap states, then they should ask why the international peacekeeping force is being deployed (I call it employed) for cattle rustling, while we are threatening to send our soldiers to save Somalia from their own youth. Please, Al Shabaab members in Juba (only if un/there), forgive us as you might have been doing. We are sending no youth to Mogadishu, yet, till we succeed in controlling the death toll that is higher than yours here.

Donors of Dollars…

It is equally as shameful as being the quick and first donors of dollars from our meagre oil money to save the starving villagers in Kenya and Somalia while hundreds have died and thousands have to die of hunger in our
own villages. Yet we call it a ‘modest donation, a drop in the ocean…’ as our president played with figures here!  “In this regard I wish to reaffirm our earlier pledge to contribute One Million United States Dollars to be devoted to the ongoing efforts to combat the devastating effects of the drought that has
affected our region,” President Kiir said in press statement. http://www.thecitizen.info/politics/president-kiir-donates-1m-for-refugees-in-horn-of-africa/

He further said the contribution is modest and may only be a drop in the ocean in terms of the enormous needs that have to be met and considers it as an important symbolic gesture that underscores government commitment to the region.

Sorry, this story is fit for my column, entitled: ‘Thinking Anti-clockwise’ on www.newsudanvision.com
If our leaders are really claiming to be thinking clockwise, then why put such blunders into the world media? It makes us very full fools!

Well, I would forgive somebody who would only convince me that we are ‘investing’ that one million for our international relations image-building, so that when we call our ‘harambee’ next time, they also respond likewise. But has Mr. Kibaki responded since we assisted Kenya with the same amount two years ago?

H.E. Salva Kiir Mayardit (in cowboy hat) among the AU leaders after he dropped our one million dollars in the ocean as he confessed it during the harambee (fundraising) in Kenya.

Wash this space for another…

But as usual, I have another poetic illustration of the situatuon from my anthology of poetry, ‘The Black Christs of Africa’,  as follows:

Poem 62

The Summary of the War

In the aftermath of our war-peace euphoria,

Sudan is reduced into a vast village of sudatoria,

Where conflict convalescents await their fate in sanatoria,

As Doctors vendor words of war in wards of war or auditoria.

Lifespan is equated to a quarter in Eastern Equatoria.

The epicentre of conflict lies in Central Equatoria,

And war has wasted Western Equatoria,

And worn out Western Bahr-el-Ghazal.

Death is nursed in Northern Bahr-el-Ghazal.

Warrap State is a war-rapped estate.

It is lakes of tears in the Lakes State.

Wells of blood swell wells of oil in the Unity State.

It’s all up and down, upside-down in Upper Nile state,

And tons of skeletons jangle in the jungles of Jonglei State.

Grave mounts outnumber the Nuba Mountains.

It blew up into blue night in the Blue Nile.

Abyei, an abyss of abuse!

Darfur: impossible to dare for!

Footnote Quote

Sudan became just another example of a resource-rich country torn by war and mass poverty—another
case of ‘natural resource curse’ (Stiglitz 2006). The ‘resource curse’ cannot be eliminated without a development process that combines growth with equity and quality of life and without the appropriate structures to govern the
development process. This is more easily said than done in the case of Sudan.

N. Shanmugaratnam

Post-war Development and the Land Questions in South Sudan

Norwegian University of Life Sciences (UMB)                                         

 

So our government is now lean and clean?

Upon public uproar in reaction to the formation of the Government of Southern Sudan  (GOSS) during the interim period, President Salva Kiir Mayardit promised to form the post-independence government a pencil-thin
one— clean and lean, like our Miss Malaika beauty babes on the catwalk. So it is! Or is it

Unlucky me! I have not been ‘uncled’ in this government. Un/fortunately, I do not fully subscribe to the youth cliques of colleagues who have been baying, praying and/or even paying for ethnic representation of their communities; be them Greater or Smaller, whatever they call themselves.

H.E. Salva Kiir at the swearing ceremony

No, the pressure that President Kiir is subjected to, and which he seems to have succumbed to at last; the pressure of ‘clanizing or tribalizing’ the government, irritates me. Creating clan, tribal, regional or sectarian or partisan ambassadors to Juba in the name of broad-based government is as politically immoral (and costly) as some individual leaders getting away with millions of the peoples’ funds in broad day light. I have long dreaded that tradition of appointing leaders or employees on the basis of ‘tactical know-who’ but not technical know-how. That is why I have been tempted to touch politics this time since the days of my column in ‘The Sudan Mirror

Well, there could be justifications for forming an all-inclusive government; one of which we fought the Arabs for, but is it cost effective? Some philosopher once said, “I don’t know the road to success, but the road to failure is trying to please everybody.” So if we wanted to practise Lincoln’s theory by making our government that of the people, for the people, and by the people, then we must have had more than 60 ministries according to our ethnic size. However, in this world where our immediate religion is money, you cannot make an action-based decision unless you first lay down a budget; a budget that does not rob others’ of their financial allocations. This is called misappropriation of funds, one of the greedy children of corruption.

Therefore, lack of funds to service all the tribal and regional representatives justifies the critics prevailing against the political obesity of our government. I admit the fact that we must form the government of national unity, but on condition that it does not turn into a government of national disunity later in a year or two. This can happen especially when we allow these ministers and their mini-stars (deputies) and legislators to employ secretaries and deploy bodyguards from the same clans that bayed and prayed for their appointment. In this way, the whole government will still look like the pre-independence one, with their ‘unity in diversity’: meaning some ministries lined from the top to the bottom with fellow certain tribesmen and women in the name of Government of South Sudan, anyway

In the middle of this analysis (don’t you call it criticism), for me, it is deemed worth declaring that the present government is neither lean (thin) nor clean (incorrupt). Apart from the government being forced to be bi-cameral, I have these and other reasons to believe in

First, to arrive at the present post-independence government, (let me grossly nickname it GROSS: Government of the Republic of South Sudan), it is the very pre-independence government (GOSS) that has been arithmetically manipulated, that is, grossly multiplied by two. It is simple: SSLA (South Sudan Legislative Assembly) times two; say, the upper house, now christened ‘Council of States, and the lower house, now South Sudan Parliament. And the cabinet, too, by two, into national ministers and state ministers (deputies). By the way, do not temper with the undersecretaries. Just wait and see. In short, the ministers plus the MPs alone
redouble the number of constitutional post holders from around 1,000 of last year to over 2000 after independence. This is when we add the states’ governments, and their trailers. Just imagine the cost, now that some departments are still running EOI (adverts) in the papers for quotations for cars ranging from range rovers, GXR V8 and the likes. I thought since that president has shunned V8s and is now using different makes, MPs, ministers and governors would not advertize for them. No, not when the fuel price’s crises
are forcing the population back to riding in ‘V2′  (on foot).

Needless to say all these new comers need directors, secretaries, drivers, just imagine how much the tax-payers will lose to their allowances (salaries being their constitutional rights) for travelling abroad, for footing medical bills, housing bills or hotel bills, school fees, cars, ladies, beers, etc. O my God! And you accepted to redouble the government, Mr. President! Well, I will only forgive them not until they redouble their efforts in providing us with what we pay them for. This time, no swelling and swirling in wheeled chairs like persons with disabilities and ordering foreign companies to do the jobs the civil servants are already salaried for. To make it worse, they even do it at a blown-up cost

As if that disappointment is not enough, why at this time did somebody decide to scrap the Ministry of Rural Development and Cooperatives? That is the most important ministry of our leader, the Late Dr. John Garang de Mabior, of which he (and the SPLM of his days) had a vision: “To take towns to the people.” There is no other miracle of tying Juba City in a trailer behind the truck and dragging it to Ramciel as now agreed or to  my village if not by this deleted ministry. This ministry even still exists in USA, a country that is now forgetting words such as ‘village’, ‘rural’, ‘slum’, etc. in their dictionaries. So now, we would just assume the slogan is being reversed to “Taking people to the towns”. What is the use of the Ministry of Environment to replace the Ministry of Development when we are talking of taking towns to the people, beginning with Juba to Ramciel? That is why I have to repeat that it seems it is the ministry that is appointed to the minister, so that it appears Ministry of the Minister of Environment and so on

Though we addressed the problem to the president, he is innocent. If he were not innocent, he would not be showered with congratulatory (aka application/appeasement/lobbying) letters for now having come up with the so-called ‘government of regional balance’. So that is what we wanted: tribes, or so-called greater regions, the
only piece of constitution of the Late Nimeiri’s government (a taboo to call it Kokora) we are still stuck to. Even those who penned our Transitional Constitution of South Sudan with the CV (experiences) of CPA and liberation
war, have the guts to describe the Republic of South Sudan as divided into three ‘Greater’ Regions, whatever that comparative adjective means. Call them Greater Bahr-el-Ghazal, Greater Equatoria and Greater Upper Nile! Hii! Uncles, come on…! Where are they— these so-called Greater something – in our transitional constitution? So that you based your government on them instead of on states, where are they in our geography? It seems ‘we’ are governing this country by histories and stories from the olden theories

That is why I call this government neither lean nor clean. It is not clean because the president of this Republic, with the backings from our community professional lobbyists, has recycled the old guards, including those who were caught off guard by the law in the previous regime. Apologies for referring to that rumour, which seems as fictitious as the lobbying lists according to USA and World Bank, the cabinet list according to Dinka Group, another list according to Equatoria Group, Nuer Group, name them. All these ghost cabinets are
apparently to blame for the political obesity of the government, characterized by recycling and interchanging of some individuals in the government behind which the line of qualified waiters looks like that of our referendum voters

The first post-independent cabinet taking an oath in Juba

 Anyway, recycling is encouraged in this world of dwindling resources and twinkling climate, but why for God’s sake do we avoid purification before recycling? It is like taking our Juba waste to the sewer and channeling it back to our houses the way we sent it! What our parliament just did recently is exactly just that. Examining the appointees after announcing them on the national TV and Radio, which then relayed them to our copy-and-paste private media is, methinks, pure political postmortem. So what the honourable deputy speaker and his crew did in that house by the end of last month (August) has no base to be criticized.

Of course, who would waste time accusing a doctor for examining and not bringing to life the bodies, which have spent a night or more in the mortuary? If not Jesus, then who else can make such corpses resurrect? I mean can the parliament dismiss, for example, my favourite one of those ministers after he even was allowed to inspect his
office and start receiving applications for office managers and secretaries from his kinsmen? Who will dare tell a person to step down after enjoying communal congratulatory messages in our ‘yes media’? I mean, who will ask the President to lash out with another Mighty Presidential Decree i.e. No. 31/2011, relieving of their duties the ministers or their deputies who were rejected in the parliament for one thing or the other

Not only that, but how politically and patriotically pure are some of the new comers brought in by Tribal Decree? I like one commentary by my fellow bystander, Elhag Paul, published in the Sudan Tribune.com. He wrote, under the heading, SPLM’s political tricks: appointing crooks to the cabinet”, and under the sub-heading: “Opportunists in cahoots with Arabs: First there are the Muslim-Christians of Tourabi who have had their bums stamped with the Muslim Quranic verse, ‘No God but God’. This group made up the membership of NCP before our referendum in 2011. They sold out to the Arabs to enjoy privileges of the regime that most abused South Sudanese. When Bashir was murdering South Sudanese such as in the Juba massacres of 1992, they were in
cahoots with him and the NIF. They distanced themselves from the people’s struggle in the South. As a result, they were made ministers and governors during all that time.” Ok, I thank him for not mentioning some names of the last year’s NCP unity campaign team of Southerners who are now ministers in Kiir’s government. However, if you want to infer some names, I refer you to that website to see more than that political taboo I have just recycled.

After all the bickering over the exclusion and whimpering over the  inclusion of some individual ministers who are considered of questionable integrity, I do not think we are convinced that the ministries themselves are lean. Just by omitting only the three, that includes Minister without Portfolio (minister without job), and renaming the rest of the 29 does not guarantee that the baby nation has leaner government. Basing on the president’s independence day promises, we were made to expect the size of the government somewhere between 18 and 22. However, from the look of things, critical analysts can conclude that Ministries are appointed for ministers, and not ministers for ministries. This means some lobby clique just sits down and crafts a ministry so that so and so is not left jobless and idle, since idle minds, especially the political ones, are the real devil’s workshop. I can bet by the name of Gen. George Athor and Peter Gatdet if you are my Thomas

 And if not that for that or the other reason, then why for Heaven’s sake is there a Ministry of Electricity and Dams vis-à-vis the Ministry of Water Resources and Irrigation? Where on this planet do we have dams outside water, or forests without environment? It is just the same game of playing around with words and they think we would not know it, or even if we happen to know it, so what? You can generate for yourself examples of rotating synonyms to create big titles in the name of ministries, as in Ministry of Higher Education, Science, Research and Technology, Ministry of General Education and Instruction, Information and Broadcasting, Defence and
Veterans’ Affairs, Culture and Heritage, Sports and Recreation, etc., some of which existed before August 26, 2011. I have no problem with Ministry of Justice, Parliamentary Affairs (which is not supposed to be a ministry if we wanted a leaner cabinet), etc. By the way, for your reminder, even cabinet of 12 ministers can still be broad-based i.e. representative if it is sincerely mmeant to be

To conclude here, but not in the minds of yours and mine, we have just created for our economic burdens unnecessary bloated and gloated consumption bureaucracies inm the name of democracy. I repeat, like the outgoing GOSS which was full of political goss (rumours), our incoming government, GROSS, is very gross (bulky): all in the pretext of broad-based government or something of that kind. So is it lean and clean now

Also published at

http://www.newsudanvision.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2439%3Athinking-anti-clockwise-south-sudan-so-our-government-is-now-lean-and-clean-&Itemid=14

 

 

That he doesn’t know me now, wow!

WE RUSH THEM INTO POWER, THEY CRUSH US INTO POWDER: This exactly is how power and politics corrupt our leaders. You give them your full votes, they give you their empty voice, or none at all! Ok, let there be elections again...

In the first place, we used to gather and share ideas together in bars, conferences and other social gatherings. In the second place, we used to gossip against GOSS together, and talked about our past survival togethr. In the third place, he used us to recommend him as a good person during his lobbying circumlocutions.

Now that he has eventually got it, he refuses to pick my phone, not even at the time of congratulatory messages such as the day after his appointment, which he now turns into my disappointment. After a day or two, he answered my call in a hurry, “Hello, hallo, hullooo! Who is this? Yes, how can I help you? Ok, ok, I changed my phone with your number. Sorry. I will give you a call later, am in a meeting…”

Hii!! come on buddy! Since when? Just by indirectly inheriting your uncle’s position that you feel such sweet all of a sudden? You puzzled me! Well, somebody should tell him that I called him to say, “Congratulations”. I don’t think I think I can ask him for money or position; and since when?

Well, this is how politics corrupts people. It comes with power, which corrupts and corrupts absolutely. Before I quit this page, and before I quit him, let me dedicate to him these poems from Chapter 4: ‘The Poly-tricks of Politics”, from my book, and then this picture from Facebook.

Poem 39

The Tower of Power

Ours is a story biblical

In history diabolical.

Once upon a time,

There was no dime,

Only nothing but love,

 traded by one noble dove

Among a people of one tribe.

There was not a crime of bribe,

Not nepotism  but mutual trust,

Not for money or honey was lust.

All were considered of equal folks,

Zero tolerance on  more equal fox.

 When they felt themselves firmly,

They said, look  we’re one family,

Come, let’s build ourselves forts,

A citadel with bricks our hearts,

Be it called ‘Tower of Power’.

But detractors saw power,

“Behold, oh, one lineage,

Speaking one language!

This is just their beginning!

Nothing will be impossible for them,

Come, let’s go and confuse their language,

That they understand one another’s speech as a babble.”

So Lo-see-far scattered them all over the earth, failing the building.

There, because of this confusion, the project was called The Tower of Babel.

Quote

The Babelization of great capitals and their cultural relativism are to me the unmistakeable sign of modernity.

Juan Goytisolo (1931 - )  Spanish novelist and essayist.

Poem 40

The War of alpha-bets

Man has two legs,

Which stride alternately.

English language has 26 legs,

And if they go alternatively,

They clash and crash like eggs.

When on others’ way stands A,

B topples it unto C, sparing D,

The result is an insult: BAD!

When M avenges A,

Overthrowing B, sparing D,

The whole process runs like: MAD!

Any attempt to abandon the Antecedents,

And go for the Precedents,

Meaning toppling M,

Makes M crushes legs-up like this W,

Who substitutes D with its western neighbor, R,

Turning the whole reshuffle into WAR!

This woe is blamed on the power-hungry alphabets,

Among which A is a legal leader.

But when it involves middlemen, namely: L, P, H,

The A wins by majority votes,

And since he is the ALPHA—

He bets for power with the leftist, the Omega,

And the arbitration culminates into an infinite wrangling

Referred to as ‘WAR of the ALPHA BETS’.

Oneof the saddest lessons of history is this: If we’ve been bamboozled long
enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. The bamboozle has
captured us. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it
back.

Carl Sagan.

Poem 41

They are crostitutes!

From south to north,

From east to west,

From south-east to north-west,

From north-east to south-west,

They do cross,

And crisscross,

Confusing us between here and there,

Confusing them between there and here,

Between north and south,

Between east and west.

With this rate of political prostitution

By means of geopolitical crostitution,

They are not prostitutes,

They are hot crostitutes!

Whoever wishes to avoid becoming dizzy must try to find out the swing’s law of motion.
We seem to be faced with a pendulum movement in history, swinging from
absolutism to democracy, from democracy back to absolute dictatorship.

Arthur Koestler, Darkness at  Noon.

Poem 42

Judas versus Jesus

At last, our land is being nationed!

Alas, our wealth is being rationed!

Between their North Pole and our South Pole,

Between the East and the West,

By their North pals and our South pals,

The self-proclaimed magi from Eastwest.

Here, the dollar donor

from Midwest

counters the dinar donor

from Mideast,

wherefore the donor dinar

encounters the donor dollar,

whereby jealous Judas auctions genius Jesus

and brutal Brutus Junius is jealous of Julius,

The senior Caesar Julius, stabbed by junior Junius,

just in order to alter the altar of justice.

But who to blame for the game,

whereon we are not again the same?

We name and blame politeachers,

of the condemned feast codenamed politics,

wherein the West wastes the East

as the East eases the West.

Three Judases, each one thrice worse than Judas!

Would they make peace? terrible hell make war

Upon their spotted souls for this offence!

William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616)

English poet and playwright.  Richard II, Act 3, Scene 2

Poem 43

Uncle in the Hot Seat

Uncle, you are sweating rivers,

Why don’t you reverse

And surrender this politi-cull seat of heat

To another cold-blooded, baldy-oldy?

Oh boy, but I’m just from fire to sweat,

Out of fire into frying pan,

Then into this flying pan;

From atomic heat to economic hate,

From hot temperature to hot temperament.

Unc-old, you seem not to be a temporal man,

But just a tampering man,

Why not tire?

Or re-retire?

Hey boy, I am the toughest tyre of the Movement,

I cannot retreat, I can now retread.

I better bake myself in this political heat,

Than beg for myself for the rest of my need

In that politicold seat.

 

It is only natural that old people would have to go, but the
problem is that there is a young man who is too impatient to wait for me.

Mahathir bin Mohamad (1925 - ) Malaysian prime minister.

Complaining about his chief political rival, “young” Tengku Razaleigh.

Straits Times (Singapore)

Poem 45

Ancestors versus Successors

“…the day of the handover!” I’d surely say

If asked what a hell is worrying  Ngong.

That be my song on a resonant gong.

“And what do you lack at this age?”

I’d open the last century’s page,

And pray so my hair were gray.

(In our generational warfare,

The aged’s lifelong welfare

Is a fanfare called pension,

Until my son is Mr. Pennson.)

Successors’ age is disease malign.

For with no gray matter I’m inferior,

Even if planted on the skull’s exterior,

All is accessed unto that nature’s favour.

Nowadays, no success is accessed by fervor.

Whereas the Ancestors’ is but a disease benign.

Poem 46

Married to Mr. America!

Hi boys,

Touch me not,

Am old-ready married,

Married to Mr. America!

And since Mr. America

Is the policeman of all men,

The husband of all husbands,

I, I… Mrs. Amer,

Wife to Mr. America,

Am the deputy husband

Of the supreme husband,

Of the interim husbands,

Of the wise wives,

Married not to America.

If America sneezes, the whole world catches the colds.

Old imperial adage

Poem 49

Mr. Cheerman for Mr. Chairman

He is just a cheer man,

For the chair man.

He doesn’t hold meetings,

He does bold beatings

With his musing bands,

With no music bonds.

When Mr. Chairman chairs a meeting,

Mr.  Cheerman cheers the meeting

With his squad of sycophants

That squat for the elephants.

When Mr. Chair-leader coughs,

mr. cheerleader laughs.

When the boss sneezes,

The boy sniffs this.

When Mr. Chairman warns,

Mr.  Cheerman mourns.

When the Big Man lies and dies,

The small man cries and dries.

I don’t want any yes-men around me. I want everybody to tell
me the truth even if it costs them their jobs.

Attributed to Samuel Goldwyn (1882 - 1974)

Polish-born U.S. film producer.

Poem 51

Stop debating us, start de-baiting us

It’s our cynical shock or surprise

That we are your political enterprise!

That your parliament dedicates 50 per cent

Of its debating time to our autonomy’s ascent,

Is unto your ominous assemblies a waste of time,

And to influence our ripe destiny is a waste of dime.

We know our poverty of property is for our weakness,

You know our poverty of erudition is from your wickedness.

We’re your weaklings because we’re dependently independent.

But now that we’ve got a vaccine to unleash on our leech,

Where else is your chance on our image to bleach?

Today, this is our very last message,

To be anchored unto our posterity passage.

We can now spell our fate, so stop debating us,

And now that we can smell your bait, start de-baiting us.

Let Blair and the British government take note and listen. Zimbabwe is for Zimbabweans.
Our people are overjoyed, the land is ours. We are now the rulers and owners of
Zimbabwe… Keep your Britain and I keep my Zimbabwe.

Robert Gabriel Mugabe, President of Zimbabwe.

Speech to ZANU-PF Congress, 5 December 2003.

 

Breaking News: LIST OF GRoSS CABINET, 2011

At last, at least, the list, the long awaited list is now out! To the high sigh of those who were subjected to 50 days of political Ramadhan and economic lent — me included — though not a minister nor even a mini-star.

Congratulations to President Kiir Mayardit for this cabinet set up. I don’t care if my uncle is hired or fired, after all, am not ‘uncled’ in any public office of South Sudan. My readers of this season, the reason I congratulate our leader for all these leaders of ours is not personal. It is national. What might be a bit personal about it is on behalf of the ministers, especially the ones who were reduced from the full ministers to caretaker ministers (demoted) after the celebration; and most importantly my condolences to those who are now reduced to scare-taker ministers (dropped). Kafara kum!

However, to whoever is now demoted and then promoted as I am seeing on SSTV at the moment, CONGS!Whether or not each of them has the certificate, diploma or degree, they all have one common ‘Degree’ (as pronounced by SSTV news anchor– thank God, the SSTV also didn’t survive the ‘rest warrant’ which the announced after this list), meaning Decree Number 29/2011 appointing the ministers as follows…

(NB: for myself: Special Congratulations to Mr. Atem Yaak Atem, no longer ‘far away from the war’! Why? Good news to MEDIA!)

List of National Ministers

1	Ministry of Cabinet Affairs	Mr. Deng Alor Kuol
2	Ministry of Defence and Veteran Affairs	Gen. John Kong Nyuon
3	Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation	Mr. Nhial Deng Nhial
4	Minister, Office of the President	Mr. Emmanuel Lowilla
5	Minister for National Security, Office of the President	Gen. Oyay Deng Ajak
6	Ministry of Justice	Mr. John Luk Jok
7	Ministry of Interior	Gen. Alison Manani Magaya
8	Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs	Mr. Michael Makuei Lueth
9	Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning	Kosti Manibe Ngai
10	Ministry of Labour, Public Service and Human Resource Development	Ms. Awut Deng Acuil
11	Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Investment	Mr. Garang Diing Akuang
12	Ministry of Information and Broadcasting	Dr Barnaba Marial Benjamin
13	Ministry of Health	Dr. Michael Milly Hussein
14	Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry	Dr. Betty Achan Ogwaro
15	Ministry of Roads and Bridges	Mr. Gier Chuang Aluong
16	Ministry of Transport	Ms. Agnes Poni Lokudu
17	Ministry of General Education and Instruction	Ustaz Joseph Ukel Abango
18	Ministry of Higher Education, Science and Technology	Dr. Peter Adwok Nyaba
19	Ministry of Environment	Mr. Alfred Lado Gore
20	Ministry of Housing and Physical Planning	Ms. Jemma Nunu Kumba
21	Ministry of Telecommunication and Postal Services	Mr.Madut Biar Yel
22	Ministry of Petroleum and Mining	Mr. Stephen Dhieu Dau
23	Ministry of Electricity and Dams	Mr. David Deng Athorbei
24	Ministry of Gender, Child and Social Welfare	Ms. Agnes Lasuba
25	Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Disaster Management	Mr. Joseph Lual Acuil
26	Ministry of Water Resources and Irrigation	Mr. Paul Mayom Akec
27	Ministry of Wildlife Conservation and Tourism	Mr. Gabriel Changson
28	Ministry of Animal Resources and Fisheries	Dr. Martin Elia Lomuro
29	Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sports	Dr. Cirino Hiteng Ofuho

List of Deputy Ministers

1	Cabinet Affairs	Mr. Wek Mamer Kuol
2	Defence and Veteran Affairs	Dr. Majak Agot Atem
3	Foreign Affairs	Ms. Grace Daterio
4	International Cooperation	Prof. Elias Nyamlel Wako
5	Justice	Mr. Paulino Wanawila Onango
6	Interior	Mr. Salva Mathok Gengdit
7	Finance	Mr. Marial Awou
8	Finance	Ms. Mary Jervas Yak
9	Labour, Public Service and Human Resource Development	Mr. Kwong Danhier Gatluak
10	Commerce, Industry and Investment	Mr. Kengen Jakor
11	Information and Broadcasting	Mr. Atem Yak Atem
12	Health	Dr. Yatta Loli Lugar
13	Agriculture and Forestry	Mr. Beda Machar Deng
14	Roads and Bridges	Mr. Simon Majok Majak
15	Transport	Mr. Mayom Kuoc Malek
16	General Education and Instruction	Ms. Rebecca Joshua Okwaci
17	Higher Education, Science and Technology	Ustaz Gabriel Kuc Abyei
18	Environment	Mr. Philip Palet Gadin
19	Housing and Physical Planning	Ms. Mary Nyawulang
20	Telecommunication and Postal Services	Ms. Bettrice Khamisa Wani
21	Petroleum and Mining	Ms. Elizabeth James Bol
22	Electricity and Dams	Ms. Rhoda David Alak
23	Gender, Child and Social Welfare	Dr. Priscilla Nyanyang Joseph
24	Humanitarian Affairs and Disaster Management	Ms.Sabina Dario Okolong
25	Animal Resources and Fisheries	Ms. Nadia Arop Dudi
26	Water Resources and Irrigation	Mr. Ali Keti Ochie
27	Wildlife Conservation and Tourism	Mr. Obuch Ojwok

LIST OF THE MINISTERS RELIEVED OF THEIR DUTIES (Decree No. 26/27)

Knowing that not all those who call Jesus ‘Beny, Beny’ (Lord, Lord), will qualify for the Kingdom of Heaven, not all who called Salva ‘Beny, Beny!’ have come back to GRoSS. Some have escorted GOSS. Check the following list for who is missing….!!!

Ministrerial Portfolios and Ministers (Caretaker list before and after Independence).

Defence                                                                      – Nhial Deng Nhial

Finance and Economic Planning                            – David Deng Athorbei

Cabinet Affairs                                                          – Kosti Manibe

Justice                                                                        – John Luk Jok

Foreign Affairs                                                          – Deng Alor Kuol

Information                                                                – Dr. Barnaba Marial Benjamin

Peace and CPA Implementation                           – Pagan Amum Okiech

Office of the President                                             – Dr. Cirino Hiteng Ofuho

Interior                                                                          – Gier Chuang Aluong

Parliamentary Affairs                                               – Michael Makuei Lueth

Investment                                                                 – Oyai Deng Ajak

Labour and Public Service                                      – Awut Deng Acuil

Health                                                                         – Dr. Luka Tombekana Monoja

Agriculture                                                                 – Dr. Ann Itto Leonardo

Roads and Transport                                               – Anthony Lino Makana

General Education                                                    – Dr. Michael Milli Hussein

Higher Education, Science and Technology         – Joseph Ukel Abango

Commerce and Industry                                          – Stephen Dhieu Dau

Environment                                                              – Isaac Awan Maper

Housing and Physical Planning                             – Jemma Nunu Kumba

Communication and Postal Services                    – Madut Biar Yel

Energy and Mining                                                   – Garang Diing Akuong

Gender, Child and Social Welfare                          – Agnes Kwaje Lasuba

Human Resource Development                               – Mary Jarvis Yak

Humanitarian Affairs and Disaster Management – James Kok Ruea

Irrigation and Water Resources                              – Paul Mayom Akech

Wildlife Conservation and Tourism                        – Abdallah Albert

Animal Resources and Fisheries                             – Nyaluk T Gatluak

Youth, Sports and Recreation                                – Makuac Teny Youk

Culture and Heritage                                                 – Gabriel Changson Chang

Minister without Portfolio                                       – Dr. Pricilla Nyanyang

 

POETIC JUSTICE: “Rats and Cockroaches have entered the city!” admits Gaddafi.

Weakleak: If I were Col. Muammar Gaddafi, I would ‘smell the rats’ and quit the room before they come and humiliate me the Saddam way. I should have learned the lessons from Ben Ali (Tunisia), Mubarak (Egypt), Saddam (Iraq), Bin Laden (World), Bashir (Sudan)… name them.

Oops Sorry! CORRECTION: Bashir is yet to follow, but is now busy preparing the ground by openly bombing his people. What I hate with all those leaders is the way they undermine others: the power of their own people to the extent of attracting the power of the foreign people to kind of intervene! I mean them ‘NATOs’ coming to test their idle weapons in Africa.

.“We order the armed forces to carry on its operations and not to stop until South Kordofan is purged as Abyei was purged before, and Abdel Azizi is arrested and brought to trial." These words from Bashir look like the 'zenga zenga' or crush them of Gaddafi as seen in the picture of two Nuba girls crushed by Bashir on June 27 in Kurchi village of Kadugli.

Col. Gadhafi now admits: "COCKROACHES AND RATS HAVE ENTERED THE CITY! ZENGA ZENGA, KICK THEM, CRUSH THEM, KILL THEM...!" In the picture, one of the RATS or ROACHES is telling him: "...Do Me...Do U..." In the picture right are two of the Bashir's 'rats or roaches' crushed in Nuba Mountains in June this year. Next is Bashir to the Hague.

The Tripling Trip to Tripoli

“Crush them!”

AK47 rattles: rat-a-tat-tat!

Gaddafi then smells the rat

As the battalions of the roaches

Begin to declare their approaches

He gropes the way to the holes of the moles

while the Coalition swaps with him the roles

Which aren’t any longer sweet

“Zenga Zenga: street by street,

From House to house:

And mouse to mouse,

Catch them!”

  Source of the poem: “The Jonglei Jongleur: and other Pennets” By J. Penn de Ngong

Poem 30

Death from Above

'Death from Above' in Lybia

Earth and Heaven

Are far apart.

Death and life

Hate each other and part.

Death is the Earth’s son

Life is the Heaven’s daughter.

They do no intermarriage.

Somebody from Heaven,

Tried to bridge the divide,

To reconcile both extremes,

By just diving into the earth

The aerial rains described in the poem

And spending only three days

Doing his mobilization down there,

And escaped up in full,

So that we do likewise.

But we do it otherwise.

My father and siblings,

Are still in their eternal sleep deep down.

Never like Jesus have they resurrected all whole,

And said farewell through their firewall

On their way up one day.

One day I saw earth and heaven

This is what happened when heaven and earth forces meet

And good and evil lock horns

In a bitter scramble for man.

Four years to the end of the 20^th Century,

In Lobone displaced people’s haven,

Death came calling from heaven,

Carried by a metallic eagle,

That spread its fiery faeces

Over the scampering camp

Tomahawk Missiles: Real 'Death from Above'

And onto our cramping faces.

We joined moles in the holes

To look for life in the earth below,

Since death captured the heavens above.

Them who remained up

Met death from above.

A mother ,old, and a month-old,

Were shared half-half

Between death and life,

As we, having readily been buried,

Resurrected from our temporary grave

In a scene where death and life

And earth and heaven

Had been wrestling for human.

The trunk of the baby and her mother’s breast,

Dangled from the trunk of a tree and hardly breathed,

Still screaming for the rest of their abdomens

That were kicking away a little gas of life,

This picture from Nuba Mountains reminds me of similar incident in Lobone as in the poem

In a hot hole smouldering from below,

An early abyss of the Sahell Republic.

Our end question was,

Did Christ reconcile the Earth and Heaven,

Forget life in the soil below,

Shed death off into the air above,

And carried his body into the paradise beyond?

Are we, the original inhabitants of Africa,

Being crucified child-and-mother,

Dismembered and scattered yonder,

Onto the twigs of our trees,

Inspecting the damage

By Mujahedeens’ Antonov,

Just for being Black Christs in Africa?

Source: The Black Christs of Africa. By the same author.

Relevant Quote

Khartoum, she said, was bombing the refugees as they walked north-west of Sobat
river.  Army plane had also bombed Nasir and its hospital on 14 May and again on 15 May (1991). Thirty-six people were dead. Dozens more were wounded…

‘The whole air stank. It was just nothing – like the only form of life was sort of buzzards and stray dogs. And just everywhere were dead cows, dead people, people hanging upside down in trees,’ Alastair later told me. They had to keep driving off the road to avoid all the bodies. They saw three children tied up together with their heads smashed in. they saw disembowelled women. Alastair took pictures. At Bor, the huts were still smouldering. They had to cover their faces to breathe inside the hospital where Bernadette Kumar had once operated.
A soldier’s body was rotting inside, and the floors were heaped with the cattle carcasses.

Deborah Scroggins, Emma’s War (Page 260)

Bor Massacres, 1991.

NOT FOR BOR: Recording and Reporting the casualties of the massacre

Your Weakleak’s Opinion Poll

 

Problem with Kiir’s decree is not the sacking, it is the backing.

I, for one, do loyally agree not with President Kiir’s decree of ‘sacking’ the boss of our money store, but with the degree of a backing given to the sacking. I mean, it’s neither ab/normal nor very un/constitutional for a president of the republic to shuffle, reshuffle and re-re-shuffle his government. That’s not his un/constitutional right, though. If not him, then who else?

Salva Kiir, given constitutional powers to do it!

My Problem is this:

1- The Sacking: The use of the word “SACK” by either the president’s office or the Sudan Tribune’s editor is un/professional and kind of inciting. What has been on our minds and in our mindsets is that after the declaration of the new nation, we wanted an immediate announcement of a new government. But then, for reasons best know to President Salva Kiir and God, we get politically subjected to over 40-day fasting in a government wilderness of the new Canaan. So now that the new government is trickling in in pairs, who and why call it ’sacking’ for God’s sake?

2- The Inciting: When I first saw the heading of that article on the ST website, I knew something must be amiss! This is the link: http://www.sudantribune.com/Kiir-sacks-South-Sudan-s-bank,39854. If there were no political or malicious backing, then why call a constitutional decree a sacking? Sacking here is a direct term connected to a crime committed by the constitutional post-bearer. So do I sense some sort of incitement against the former BOSS boss, Elijah Malok Aleng? Does the sacking also apply to the Chief Justice, John Wol Makech? Will the term ‘sack’ also be tagged to the reshuffle of the old and whole cabinet body? If so, then why would the president be described as sacking the whole nation?

If I were the editor of that story, (which will be copied and pasted alive by our recycling media, I know), I would use the term ‘relieve of his/their duties’ so that the unwarranted reaction (I mean the nasty comments this story warranted, thanks to whoever scrapped them off from that ST page) would not have come against our president. Those boys of the ST or Facebook overdid it, anyway.

3- The Backing:

If the claims by the critics also contributed to the mass reaction against the appointment of just two positions in the government, then who were doing the backing? And who were doing the barking. I mean both the backing to the sacking and the backing to the barking? If it was discovered that the two deputies-turn-governor/president of the bank and the justice branches of the government happened to come from one ‘clan’ as claimed, then I blame the backing to the sacking of the top shots and the hiring of their No.2s. But if the appointments that caused all these disappointments were based on qualifications, and not quali-fictions, as I am mad/made to understand, then I condemn the barking to the sacking (criticism).

4- The Timing:

Why for Chris/t’s sake is the reshuffle being made in pairs? e.g. Security pairs first, Bank/Judiciary duo now, then the next pairs will…..! I wonder why especially when the whole economy has been paralysed and the whole nation placed under the care of the caged babysitters, call them caretaker ministers. These care-takers actually become scare takers as evidenced in the trauma they have been undergoing since independence. I like the comment made by Hon. Makuach Teny in a youth conference at Nyakuron today: “If the president does not want to announce the new government, then we shall continue to take care of it.” joked the caretaker minister for Youth and Sports in reaction to the complaints from the conference.

NB: This page will be concluded tomorrow…..(on condition that this political Ramadhan we are subjected to by lobbyists is interrupted with good news).

Weakleaks is hereby calling upon those extra-eyed readers to understand that this critique is not by a critic, but by an analyst. This writer is just analysing the aftermath of the dis/appointments already caused/made.