Carl Odera and
By Carl Odera and
Edmund Blair
Whether South Sudan tips into a broader ethnic war or draws back from the brink largely depends on two men who have long tussled for power: the president from the dominant Dinka tribe and the ambitious deputy he sacked in July, Riek Machar, a Nuer. Both ethnic groups, spurred on by their leaders, have clashed in the past, giving the latest spiral of violence an air of depressing inevitability for many South Sudanese, desperate for development in one of the poorest places in Africa.
“Neither cares much about their people,” said Chuo, who repairs motorbikes in Juba. “Instead, they are focusing too much on personal grudges - the left-overs from their old days.”
The United States and other Western backers of the new nation are scrambling with regional African states to broker talks, but have limited leverage to end fighting that has killed hundreds of people and driven 40,000 to UN bases for shelter.
Failure to halt the escalation could have wider fallout in an already volatile region. Sudan may be drawn in if there is a threat to oil fields from which it derives vital fees from pumping crude across its land. And other neighbours fret about a descent into chaos. Uganda has already sent troops to Juba.
Both leaders say they are ready to talk. But old habits die hard. Kiir said he was the target of a “foiled coup” and rounded up rivals. Machar slipped away and has mustered militia forces.
“I am in the bush, and I am trying my best to have a better negotiating position,” Machar, 61, who holds a doctorate from Britain’s University of Bradford, told Reuters on a crackly mobile phone line from an undisclosed location.
The international community has poured in billions of dollars of aid and sent in a myriad of advisers to build the new state. But it has been unable to fix the dysfunction that has festered at the top of government and which came to a head in the summer when 62-year-old Kiir dismissed his vice president.
“Opportunities were certainly missed to engage in more robust preventive diplomacy over the past few months as the political crisis began gathering momentum,” said John Prendergast, member of a US group of intellectuals that cajoled Washington to back South Sudan’s split from Sudan.
For almost a year before Machar’s dismissal, the two men’s relationship in office was defined by “miscommunication or mistrust or silence”, said former culture ministry undersecretary Jok Madut Jok, who left his post in April.
The power play caused stasis in government, and most worryingly derailed crucial efforts to build a programme of national reconciliation between bigger ethnic groups, such as Dinka and Nuer, and the dozens of others that have long clashed over control of the south’s scant resources.
Jok, now chairman of the Sudd Institute think-tank, described how Machar formed a committee to draw up a “practical, scientific” plan to rebuild ethnic relations, only to have it disbanded by Kiir, who put church leaders in charge to “focus on praying away the woes of South Sudan and nothing more.”
Those who know the two men give similar accounts of the two characters on whose shoulders so much rests.
Kiir, largely educated in the bush, has patched up militia rivalries to hold together the brittle SPLM/SPLA that fought Sudan and now runs the south. But they say he lacks the vision of his predecessor, John Garang, who died in a helicopter crash in 2005, the year a peace deal was signed with Sudan.
Machar, his acquaintances say, is a highly intelligent rival whose political ambitions tend to trump any national agenda. He led a splinter SPLA group in 1991 and his Nuer troops massacred Dinkas in Bor town that year. In 1997, he signed a unilateral deal with Khartoum that gave him an official post in Sudan.
“Anything short of the two men sitting down and trying to work it out will not work,” said Jok.
But bringing the two together for now has hit deadlock. Kiir’s government has refused to release the group of rival politicians he detained. Machar says they must be freed as they are the ones who will handle any negotiations.
Much may depend on Kiir’s reputation as a conciliator, often bringing in rival militias even though it could mean putting political influence before competence in government.
“Kiir has always said that he doesn’t want his people to turn back again to war,” said Foreign Minister Barnaba Marial Benjamin, citing the president’s past talks with opponents. “We talked to them and they were absorbed into our government.”
Eric Reeves, a fellow American activist for South Sudan with Prendergast, said Machar needed to be convinced that prolonging any ethnic conflict would mean he would lose US or other Western support. “But there is no real leverage,” he said.
The United Nations plans to beef up its peacekeeping force in South Sudan, where the Akobo UN base was overrun and looted by Nuers who are blamed for killing 11 Dinkas sheltering there.
But the patchwork nature of the SPLA army and shifting loyalties means there is little chance of turning the UNMISS force into a robust intervention brigade like the one that quelled a rebellion in next door Democractic Republic of Congo. “If you don’t know where your enemy is coming from, or who your enemy is, it doesn’t really matter how heavily armed you are,” said Reeves.
Reuters
By Carl Odera and
Edmund Blair
Whether South Sudan tips into a broader ethnic war or draws back from the brink largely depends on two men who have long tussled for power: the president from the dominant Dinka tribe and the ambitious deputy he sacked in July, Riek Machar, a Nuer. Both ethnic groups, spurred on by their leaders, have clashed in the past, giving the latest spiral of violence an air of depressing inevitability for many South Sudanese, desperate for development in one of the poorest places in Africa.
“Neither cares much about their people,” said Chuo, who repairs motorbikes in Juba. “Instead, they are focusing too much on personal grudges - the left-overs from their old days.”
The United States and other Western backers of the new nation are scrambling with regional African states to broker talks, but have limited leverage to end fighting that has killed hundreds of people and driven 40,000 to UN bases for shelter.
Failure to halt the escalation could have wider fallout in an already volatile region. Sudan may be drawn in if there is a threat to oil fields from which it derives vital fees from pumping crude across its land. And other neighbours fret about a descent into chaos. Uganda has already sent troops to Juba.
Both leaders say they are ready to talk. But old habits die hard. Kiir said he was the target of a “foiled coup” and rounded up rivals. Machar slipped away and has mustered militia forces.
“I am in the bush, and I am trying my best to have a better negotiating position,” Machar, 61, who holds a doctorate from Britain’s University of Bradford, told Reuters on a crackly mobile phone line from an undisclosed location.
The international community has poured in billions of dollars of aid and sent in a myriad of advisers to build the new state. But it has been unable to fix the dysfunction that has festered at the top of government and which came to a head in the summer when 62-year-old Kiir dismissed his vice president.
“Opportunities were certainly missed to engage in more robust preventive diplomacy over the past few months as the political crisis began gathering momentum,” said John Prendergast, member of a US group of intellectuals that cajoled Washington to back South Sudan’s split from Sudan.
For almost a year before Machar’s dismissal, the two men’s relationship in office was defined by “miscommunication or mistrust or silence”, said former culture ministry undersecretary Jok Madut Jok, who left his post in April.
The power play caused stasis in government, and most worryingly derailed crucial efforts to build a programme of national reconciliation between bigger ethnic groups, such as Dinka and Nuer, and the dozens of others that have long clashed over control of the south’s scant resources.
Jok, now chairman of the Sudd Institute think-tank, described how Machar formed a committee to draw up a “practical, scientific” plan to rebuild ethnic relations, only to have it disbanded by Kiir, who put church leaders in charge to “focus on praying away the woes of South Sudan and nothing more.”
Those who know the two men give similar accounts of the two characters on whose shoulders so much rests.
Kiir, largely educated in the bush, has patched up militia rivalries to hold together the brittle SPLM/SPLA that fought Sudan and now runs the south. But they say he lacks the vision of his predecessor, John Garang, who died in a helicopter crash in 2005, the year a peace deal was signed with Sudan.
Machar, his acquaintances say, is a highly intelligent rival whose political ambitions tend to trump any national agenda. He led a splinter SPLA group in 1991 and his Nuer troops massacred Dinkas in Bor town that year. In 1997, he signed a unilateral deal with Khartoum that gave him an official post in Sudan.
“Anything short of the two men sitting down and trying to work it out will not work,” said Jok.
But bringing the two together for now has hit deadlock. Kiir’s government has refused to release the group of rival politicians he detained. Machar says they must be freed as they are the ones who will handle any negotiations.
Much may depend on Kiir’s reputation as a conciliator, often bringing in rival militias even though it could mean putting political influence before competence in government.
“Kiir has always said that he doesn’t want his people to turn back again to war,” said Foreign Minister Barnaba Marial Benjamin, citing the president’s past talks with opponents. “We talked to them and they were absorbed into our government.”
Eric Reeves, a fellow American activist for South Sudan with Prendergast, said Machar needed to be convinced that prolonging any ethnic conflict would mean he would lose US or other Western support. “But there is no real leverage,” he said.
The United Nations plans to beef up its peacekeeping force in South Sudan, where the Akobo UN base was overrun and looted by Nuers who are blamed for killing 11 Dinkas sheltering there.
But the patchwork nature of the SPLA army and shifting loyalties means there is little chance of turning the UNMISS force into a robust intervention brigade like the one that quelled a rebellion in next door Democractic Republic of Congo. “If you don’t know where your enemy is coming from, or who your enemy is, it doesn’t really matter how heavily armed you are,” said Reeves.
Reuters
