Date: 10.8.2025
The creation of many parties in South Sudan is a disguise and swirled gamble. Emerging from a liberation struggle with one political movement and military was a great test for South Sudan. It has struggled to position itself in a multiparty and democratic system. The rush of political parties and movements has spiralled to outweigh the SPLM in an insurrection for control of power and resources without gaining mass support. Individuals or groups of individuals form or gather to form political parties or movements to position themselves on opportunities for power and resource control at the expense of the people. This surge of political parties and movements attempts to use firepower or obstructive political mobilisation to win recognition and power for themselves, regardless of whether their actions favour the people or not.
These political parties and movements are either formed in the capital, Juba, state capitals or foreign cities without necessarily recognising the needs and values of the very people they claim to represent.
On the other hand, the people are overwhelmed with the ideology of the liberation struggle for which they contributed and sacrificed immensely. The people owned the liberation struggle, offered their lives and resources and raised their voices for the SPLM to earn local, national, regional and international recognition and support. The SPLM never made a decision without seeking approval from the people. Attempts at decisions made by the SPLM leadership council without the involvement of the people have not been successful.
Whenever the SPLM/A intended to wage a war and mobilise recruits, it sought the endorsement of the chiefs, elders, youth, women and religious leaders. Victory over victories was won with the endorsement of the people as the owners of the liberation struggle.
Peace initiatives that were conducted without the endorsement of the people had not yielded any results. One example of such initiatives, from many others between 1988 and 2000, was the Abuja Talks.
Learning from these impasses and the value of engaging the people to own the liberation struggle, the SPLM organised the 1994 Chukudum Convention to organise the people and introduced a civil administration that separated the military from civil functions, the 1998 Yambio Economic Conference, and the 2001 Kejiko 1 and 2 Religious Leaders Conferences.
The 1998 Yambio Economic Conference produced the SPLM blueprint "Truck III Peace Through Development", which set the platform and drove Sudan into the CPA. It laid three tracks for the achievement of peace in Sudan:
1. Peace negotiations and dialogues;
2. Popular uprising and
3. Armed struggle.
It first organised the local government structures into Boma Liberation Councils, Payam Liberation Councils and County Liberation Councils and strengthened these structures by establishing and supporting the capacities of County Development Committees. These local government structures were responsible for the mobilisation of human and financial resources, which rejuvenated the then ailing SPLM/A to rise again and win the CPA. The same local government structures mobilised the people to vote for the referendum and won it.
Today, especially in the helm of the RARCSS, the voices of the people and the importance of local governments are silenced because their functions and voices do not favour the rise of political manoeuvres. A huge gap is created and continues to tear apart the bond between the political spectrum and citizens. The political lenses view the people and their local governments as a burden and distinguish themselves with a special status of honour mixed with self-prestige and fear of the unknown.
I take this opportunity to remind our political leaders who were nurtured and groomed by the SPLM that the CPA was successful because of the County Development Committee consultative and review conference of 2004 held in Yambio at the invitation of the Chairman. The outcome of the conference reinforced the SPLM position at the Naivasha negotiations table and pushed the negotiation team to visit South Sudan and hear from the true voices.
What went wrong after the referendum is that political parties and leaders now undermine the voices of the people and push for power and control without the people themselves as the owners.
The conflict, which emanated from grievances for power and resources control erupted on December 15, 2013, and there was an opportunity for dialogue in 2015 with the signing of the ARCSS on August 12, 2015, but the people were not consulted; conflict and dialogue were deemed to be political, not requiring people's voices. Why then did people's peace be disturbed by these political forces?
The ARCSS suddenly collapsed, and there was a good move to conduct a "National Dialogue". Unfortunately, the outcome of the National Dialogue was not honoured, and a rerun of another dialogue was launched that produced the RARCSS.
The RARCSS generated an increased number of political parties, which were mobilised from the streets and accepted to take part in the dialogue. As it has been with the ARCSS, the RARCSS did not seek the voices of the people and undermined the concerns and observations raised by the President. Now the result is that the RARCSS is in limbo, near collapse. Who is to blame?
South Sudan has its owners: the ethnic, tribal, religious elders, traditional leaders, chiefs, rainmakers, youth, women and children. It does not belong to political parties, individuals or specific groups of people. Isolating the people from their own nation for which they have shed blood is a big mistake and a sin.
The National Dialogue had spoken and tabled the voices of the people mobilised from all the South Sudan local Councils. What makes it difficult to honour the voices of the people?
The SPLM/A tried to mobilise people and resources on their own since 1991, but none of those efforts succeeded except after the 1994 Chukudum Convention, 1998 Yambio, 2001 Kejiko, 2004 Yambio Review Conference and the referendum.
I'm calling to remind our President, Vice Presidents, Council of Ministers and National Parliament (National Assembly and Council of States) to honour the voices of the people and engage the Local Government Councils and the State Governments on the path to peace. The current journey for peace is not in the hands of the politicians or political parties, but in the hands of the people. Give the people their power back and honour their responsibilities in the management of the nation.
Rebellions, movements, political elites or political oppositions have grabbed away the power from the people and wrongly ride for themselves.
There shall not be any genuine peace unless there is an open gate to listen to the voices of the people and reinstate the National Dialogue. The people are capable and can resolve the current status quo.
END
Note: Edited for grammar clarity only.
