We Need Peace Not Renewed Conflict, Bishop Urges

Bishop Eduardo Hiiboro Kussalla called upon the groups to avoid misuse of guns to cause war and conflict. He pointed out that war does not help and instead causes distractions and hinder development.

This comes after the two groups of soldiers differed causing fear among citizens of a probable attack in revenge and settling scores between the rival groups.

 “Do not adhere to any push, to any feeling that you have to go to war and fight inorder to get what you want. You may not get it and your people may not get it. Let us avoid confrontations that lead to gunfire or violence,” His Lordship said.

 He added that instead the two aggrieved factions should talk and look for a solution to the conflict instead of taking back the state to the era of war.

 He called upon them to take back their thoughts to the days of war whereby many lost their lives, the country was devastated in all spheres, millions of people were displaced while even a greater number has never recovered from the ravages of war.

 “All of you are under the agreement that has been signed. All of you are fully in the government. All of you are a part and parcel of this agreement. If it spoils then you are at fault, you will have let down the whole country,” His Lordship pleaded.

 He appealed to them to calm down for the sake of peace adding that the citizens are already traumatized by the covid-19 pandemic; they do not need to add violence on top of that.

 Tension has been brewing between the two rival camps who initially formed a force together but early last month one general defected to the government and thus causing mistrust among the former colleague and his force.

 Since the signing of the revitalized peace agreement in February, there has been relative peace in South Sudan and the Citizens hope this is a new dawn to peace that has escaped the world’s youngest country for over a decade.

 The call from Barani Eduardo came as the president of the Republic of South Sudan announced several much awaited resolutions that have been pending in the implementation of the peace process. There has been a stalemate on the power sharing deals among the states with the parties disagreeing on the issue. The president announced that the former government of National unity will take six states namely, Central Equatorial, Eastern Equatorial, Lakes state, Warrap state, Nothern Bahr El Ghazel and unity state.

 The SPLM/A-IO party takes three states namely Jonglei, Western Bahr Ghazel and western Equatorial state with SSOA party taking the upper Nile state.

 The presidency has also reviewed the lockdown measures earlier issued to curb the spread of Covid-19 with internal flights expected to resume soon and curfew time pushed from 7 pm to 10 pm.

 Currently South Sudan has 2211 positive cases with 45 deaths.