Saturday, February 27, 2016

The Woes of South Sudan and the Futility of My Life’s Work


My recent monitoring and evaluation trip to Lakes State reminded me how my life, my work, my worries, my desires, my problems along with those of most of you reading this are miniscule compared to what millions are facing day in day out in South Sudan.


For those who follow South Sudan, you are aware that Lakes State which lies in the middle of the country has been a mess for the last few years. A lot of the violence has been fueled due to exploitation by political/military leaders of the region, but as a result, over the last year hundreds of people have been killed in the state. Every other person you see walking the streets is armed to the teeth.


In short, the problem is the proliferation of arms to young cattle keepers (Gelweng), the arms are given to the Gelweng for two major reasons - firstly, to protect the cattle that are owned by the rich and powerful military leaders and secondly, to have the Gelweng as an insurance policy so that in case another civil war breaks out these same youth become the first line of defence against a rebellion. So it’s not really hard to imagine for anyone that if you give a lot of AK-47’s with a lot of ammo to kids in their teens, it is bound to not end well most of time. The result has been catastrophic for the state which has been engulfed in lootings, cattle raids and tit for tat revenge killings among subclans.


The worse thing this has done is break down the traditional structures that were in place for centuries to deal with violence. Historically, any sort of violence among communities was sorted out by the Paramount Chiefs of the communities. The word of Chiefs was Gospel. Not anymore, now AK-47’s have become the new Gospel. In many communities of Lakes State the real power now lies with the youth and not the traditional authorities.


Our program (USAID’s flagship in South Sudan) in the region recognized that and brought them to the table, making them part of the conversation because without them there would be no end to this violence. Ideally, nothing will change in the state till there is a complete disarmament campaign done, but that is a pipe dream, at least in the near future because the state and local government don’t have the desire or the resources to carry it out. Disarmament only works when it is done simultaneously in all communities because no one community will give up their arms first to leave their homes and cattle vulnerable to the 5 others that surround them. Nevertheless, once the youth had a seat at the table everyone realised that they themselves were sick of the fighting and wanted to have normal lives so that they could go to school, cultivate crops, live to get married and have their own families. We helped them become part of the solution by supporting their community policing system where Gelweng in each Payam became the eyes and ears for the local authorities to help maintain the peace. We are also looking at ways of engaging the youth in other activities that would provide a viable alternative once they leave their guns because leaving a lucrative life of looting and raiding cattle for doing “nothing” all day would also be wishful thinking.


Anyways, all of this background information brings me to the real reason behind my writing this note. The cover photo you see is from my recent trip to such a gathering where the two guys holding hands are Gelweng leaders from different subclans who were until recently trying to kill each other but now work to prevent youth from both communities from trying to raid, loot and kill one another.


Five minutes after I took this picture at the gathering where traditional chiefs, government officials and these two youth leaders were present, we heard shots being fired. If you’ve lived in Lakes recently you know that shots being fired isn’t that unusual so no one took much notice. A boy ran up and said something in the ear of Keer, the young man in the polo shirt on the right. Keer immediately turned around and started running in the direction of where the shots were being fired from. About 2 mins after that, shots were fired in our direction and everyone in the gathering ran inside a concrete building to take cover till the shooting stopped.


Long story short, we later found out that a Gelweng was drunk in the middle of the day and shooting in the air, when his uncle tried to stop him he shot at his uncle, it was at that time that the younger boy had run up to Keer and informed him. Keer fearlessly ran straight to that drunk Gelweng and tried to wrestle the AK-47 out of his hand. As a result, a shot that was fired hit and killed a prison guard who was standing near by, which prompted fellow prison guards to return fire (these were the rounds that came in our direction).


The Gelweng youth who shot and killed the guard was able to escape but Keer was able to convince the prison guards and police not to retaliate against other Gelweng youth and joined forces with the authorities to capture the perpetrator. Keer single handedly prevented possibly several deaths just that day. At such a tender age he is brave leader, he commands respect from his peers and authorities alike, he is crucial in maintaining peace in his community. A boy like that in the West would be lauded for his heroism, would have the chance to attend prestigious universities, who knows maybe even run for office one day. But unfortunately in Lakes State, Keer might become the very next victim of the same violence he strives to prevent everyday. How is my life or anyone else’s life worth more than Keer’s life? How does this all make any sense?


After the incident, I had a nice air conditioned Landcruiser that whisked me and my colleagues out of there. We came back to our nice air conditioned offices, drank our Nescafe, wrote a report on what happened, spoke about it over some nice lebanese dinner and went to bed. Keer unfortunately doesn’t have the luxury to do this, when he deserves it way more than any of us. About 5 minutes into us taking shelter in the concrete building we realised a really old, frail woman hiding between two desks. She had probably been witness to many a situations like this in her life. My colleague, who was also crouched under the desk looked at her and the lady pointed her fist to her mouth. My colleague had a bag of nuts that she handed over to the lady. Later on a local colleague of ours heard the old lady saying “at least some good came out of the shooting for me.”


While Keer keeps struggling to keep his community from killing each other, development workers like me spend our time complaining about how we’re underappreciated, overworked, how we “deserve” nice vacations, a pay raise etc. It’s sickening. I wish I knew the ending to this show we call life. I wish I knew the “master plan”, the big picture, so I could be content in knowing that guys like Keer aren’t just going to die in vain, that there will be justice in an afterlife. I don’t know how much longer I can go on without knowing this? Most of me doesn’t even want to carry on living this frivolous existence anymore.