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President and peace saboteur

South Sudan's President Salva Kiir wants everything but peace, and sticks in the wheels of dialogue and peace processes with both defiance and abuse of power. Why does he act as he does?




(THIS ARTICLE IS MACHINE TRANSLATED by Google from Norwegian)

Quite unexpectedly, the UN Security Council has once again – and this time unanimously – decided to uphold the sanctions against South Sudan. The resolution tells how deep the distrust is to the current regime in South Sudan – and in particular to the country's President Salva Kiir. Together with the United States and the United Kingdom, Norway is one of the three troika countries, and supported the UN resolution. Under the peace agreement of 2005, the three Troika countries have a special responsibility for peace and development in South Sudan.

The UN resolution is about so-called smart sanctions targeting central political and military leaders who repeatedly and repeatedly opposed a peace treaty during the civil war, and who committed particularly serious crimes during the war.

This is not least due to Salva Kiir's behavior during both the peace talks in Addis Ababa during the period from January 2014 to summer 2015, and in the period after. In August last year, negotiators in the regional cooperation organization IGAD – with full support from the African Union, the UN, the Troika countries and China – came up with a proposal for an agreement which they requested the parties to sign. Riek Machar, leader of the armed resistance struggle, and Pagan Amum, leader of the SPLM group, wrote 17. August 2015 under the agreement. Kiir refused, but had to do so a few days later.

Defiantly. Since then, Kiir and his regime in Juba have done their utmost to delay implementation. Along the way, the regime has insulted the vast majority of its former friends and partners from South Sudan, Norway included. In April this year, Kiir had to give up his opposition to form a national unity government that will rule the country until the 30-month elections. Riek Machar returned to Juba on April 26, and was sworn in as 1st Vice President. Four days later, the new national transitional government was in place.

But President Salva Kiir has, in time, also continued to doubt his own will for peace and reconciliation, and thus the credibility of the unity government.

First, Kiir has consistently abstained from a joint public appearance with Riek Machar, both of whom could speak of reconciliation and peace. He then opposed that Riek Machar should make his own public appearance at a meeting in Juba, where Machar alone could speak about the necessity of reconciliation. Machar has thus been referred to speak during worship services in Juba, which does not have the same legitimacy as a public meeting organized by the government.

When the transitional government was appointed, Kiir retained all the ministers who had really been strong opponents both of the peace treaty and of the fundamental respect for fundamental human rights in South Sudan. The foremost of these ministers is Minister of Information Michael Leuth Makuei, who violates freedom of speech on a daily basis and makes abusive statements about the UN and representatives of the African Union in the country several times a week.

A few days after the government was in place, Kiir, on the suggestion of a group of ethnic leaders from the Dinka people, appointed ten people as their special political advisers in the president's office. This appointment can have only one purpose: to undermine the authority of the new government.

President Kiir demanded that Garang jr. was to be thrown out of the government meeting because he was not properly dressed.

During the nearly six weeks that have passed since the unifying government in this ruined country was appointed, it has had two meetings. At the first meeting, all the time was spent discussing and adopting rules for how to be dressed in government meetings (it was stated that it should be a dark suit). For the ensuing meeting, the new Minister of Water, Mabior Garang – son of the great national leader John Garang who died in a helicopter accident in the summer of 2005 – came with a bow instead of a tie. President Kiir then demanded that Garang jr. was to be thrown out of the government meeting because he was not properly dressed. Garang had to leave the meeting. He went out and switched to a tie, but when he re-entered the meeting, he was again thrown out, this time because he upset the president. I do not remember that Salva Kiir's hatred of the Garang family has taken such forms of expression in the past.

The country's new gentlemen. Kiir has also repeatedly attacked "the powers" that have imposed on him the peace treaty, Norway included. He repeats his criticism again and again, because these states will not transfer aid money for the purposes the government wants.

He has contravened the new peace agreement changed the country's administrative structure from 10 states to 28. The new scheme means that the administrative boundaries are mostly ethnic, and of course it does not promote national reconciliation and integration. In addition, the new scheme becomes much more expensive than the old one.

Why does President Kiir act like he does? The main reason is that journalists hesitate to write about. Kiir is old and worn. He is increasingly surrounding himself with advisers from his own tribe, the Dinka people. This population group, which represents about 35 per cent of the population of South Sudan, has in recent years increasingly acted as local imperialists. They take land and other property, often forcibly, from other peoples groups far from the traditional areas of the Dinka people, without regard to laws and without financial compensation. The Dinkas have become the people of South Sudan.

Salva Kiir has repeatedly attacked "the powers" that have imposed on him the peace treaty, Norway included.

Broken dreams. Salva Kiir is almost illiterate because he has never had any schooling. He suffers from diabetes 2. He has a family where many suffer from alcoholism, and he also has major problems with his alcohol abuse. He demonstrates again and again that he is incapacitated as head of state and government, and to cover all this, he is increasingly acting as if he were the dictator of the country. Several reports from the African Union, the UN and other international institutions have documented, to all intents and purposes, that President Salva Kiir and his closest advisers from the Dinka people in 2013 purposefully propelled political conflict within the SPLM government party, which in December 2013 ended in a very devastating civil war . Thus Kiir and his advisers from the Dinka people are the main responsible for all the war has cost of human life and material destruction.

The war lasted until the summer of 2015. At that time, every fifth inhabitant of the country – two million people – was homeless. About 700 had fled to neighboring countries. At least 000 people were killed and hundreds of thousands injured physically and mentally. Physical violence against women has been particularly extreme, with many thousands of women raped as part of the war.

Food production in one of Africa's best agricultural areas has largely stopped. Oil production, which accounted for 98 per cent of government revenue, is more than halved. South Sudan is today technically bankrupt – a ruined society where about four million of the country's approximately 11 million inhabitants need food and medical help from the international community.

Immediately five years ago, on July 9, 2011, I and several other Norwegians were in Juba celebrating independence. Then we got to participate in the people's dream of peace and development.

Today, all dreams are shattered, and it will be a long time before ordinary people in South Sudan again dare to believe in the promises of their leaders.


Hanssen was former head of Norwegian People's Aid.

Halle Jørn Hanssen
Halle Jørn Hanssen
Former Secretary General of Norwegian People's Aid, TV correspondent, politician and author.

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