February 4, 2012 (JUBA) –  “The Government should take the criminals in for justice,” said Akuei Deng Akuei, a leader from the Dinka Bor community. He said this yesterday during a weekly forum at the Citizen Newspaper compound. He was referring to the criminals who have been carrying out the killings, raiding of cattle and abductions of children and women in Jonglei state.

The quote was a response to a question directed to them as the leaders of the Dinka Bor community present at the time, by journalsit John Penn. Akuei said the local chiefs, the commissioner, the governor should have an idea of the criminals who are carrying out these killings and raiding. In relation to this statement, he gave an example of himself as a father, that if his son was to come home with a car which he never gave him money for, then he has the responsibility to ask him where he got it from.

In that respect, he said that local chiefs who see cows in their area that do not belong to their community members before, should investigate and bring such people to justice; they should at least ask them where they got them from.

“We see that not only the Dinka Bor community leaders think that the local chiefs should know the criminals involved, but also the Murle community leaders. As we can see from last Friday’s Forum, 27th of January, when Mary Boyoi said, “If the Government wants to stop the conflict, it is very simple; it can just ask the chiefs from Murle to bring the criminals from their area.”

“Sometimes ladies are killed and children abducted and if the matter is reported to the government, people from the other side (Murle), would ask, ‘how do you know that it is a Murle?” said Hon. Phillip Thon Nyok, a state Member of Parliament. However, he also brought up the fact that it is very difficult to identify the people who are responsible for the abductions and that there are no any criminals who are in prison at the moment for the crimes that have been carried out in the Jonglei state, particularly the criminals from the Dinka Bor Community, since they were called to represent the Dinka Bor community.

On the issue of the root cause of tribal conflicts in Jonglei, both Akuei and Thon stressed on under development being the major root cause. “The root cause of conflicts is backwardness,” said Thon. Working hard to develop the area was suggested by Akuei, because this would improve the thinking and the mentality of the people. There is also a necessity to intensify the peace talks and the disarmament of the civilians.

Akuei also said that both the communities which are fighting now never went to school and therefore it would be necessary to take development to the people in Jonglei state. We believe if services are taken there, the situation will improve.

Meanwhile the same leaders yesterday disagreed on the issue of dividing the Jonglei state into two states terming it as not the solution over the conflict that is being experienced by the people of the state. They said if there is a need of doing so then it should be necessitated by objective factors and not because of quarrels between tribes.“If they want their own state will they build walls similar to the Berlin wall which had been removed to keep neighbors away?” asked Akuei Deng Akuei. 

Due to the conflicts that is being experienced in Jonglei state some leaders of Murle community told The Citizen newspaper last Friday during the Weekly Forum that they want to be given their own state and if that is not possible then the government should let them join other neighboring states not to continue being administered from Jonglei state because they are being discriminated there.

Conflicts in Jonglei state have been of a concern to the government and the people of South Sudan because it is increasing everyday and are encouraging insecurity and lack of free movements in the state.

The Member of Parliament representing the Bor Counties in the state Philip Thon Nyok said that the only solution to these conflicts is universal disarmament of all civilians by the government and the encouraging of peace and reconciliation among the communities.

Responding to the allegations which were made by the Murle leaders during the Citizen Weekly Forum last Friday that they were being discriminated and that there was tribalism practiced in Bor town and other parts of Jonglei state as baseless accusations.

“Akuei who was representing the Bor community in the forum said that the idea is not to divide Jonglei state but to bring development to the people by building roads, schools, hospitals and look for the better ways of bringing a lasting peace in the state.”

During the forum which was attended by two leaders from Bor community, including the Member of Parliament in the state government and many media houses, the leaders from Bor condemned the conflicts and encouraged peace among the people of Jonglei.

“We suggest to move together as people of Jonglei and if our people see us together as leaders they may change their minds and learn to coexist with one another,” said Thon. He added that during the elections time people of Murle listened to their leaders and came out in large numbers and voted for SPLM and they can do the same thing now by talking to their people because they are killing innocent people and they say those killing others are criminals.

There is no single day where Dinka Bor has moved to Murle land and attacked innocent people and adducted children instead it is the Murle who always attacked Bor land and adduct the children and take all the cattle. Asked whether Dinka from Bor sell children to Murle as claimed by the community, he said he could not answer this question because he lacked information about it.