Kiir: Please, Overhaul the Old system BY Michael Thon Mangok, SOUTH SUDAN
AUG. 5/2011, SSN; As the dust settles over the euphoric scenes that greeted the dawn of a new era in South Sudan, the political banter occupying the corridors of power is who will make the list of Salva Kiir’s new cabinet? Anxiety has gripped the political elite and the common man as speculation and intense lobbying reaches pitch fever about the first post independence cabinet. Will Kiir crack the whip on his incompetent and corrupt cronies and replace them with technocrats who will deliver the economy of South Sudan from a tailspin? When the President releases his cabinet list there will be both joy and mourning--- those that will be appointed and those dropped. Tribal warlords whose anointed leaders will be appointed to the positions they had lobbied for alongside their kinsmen, will slaughter bulls to celebrate the appointment. Those that will not be appointed will now invoke tribal sentiments and attempt to stir their kinsmen to renege because they have not been appointed. Kiir cannot be held at ransom and as a Head of State who has a Herculean task to rehabilitate a moribund economy as citizens do not expect him to dispense patronage. When the United States of America first black President Barrack Obama visited Ghana in 2007 he made a rousing speech where he said “Africa does not need strong men but strong institutions”. Will the fledgling democracy of South Sudan pick the establishment of strong institutions in place of patronage? There is need to focus on building independent institutions rather than placating the wishes of tribal warlords. The South also seems to be hostage of the Khartoum regime mentality and there are fears emerging that it may not be any different from its oppressors in the north. A distinguished Ugandan professor of Anthropology at Columbia University, and the head of Makerere Institute for Social Research Mahmood Mamdani during a public lecture in 2010 argued that, “The South will separate from the north but the question is will the new government in the south establish the new political order or will they produce the old one?” He was discussing a paper titled ‘the significance of south Sudan referendum.’ To respond to Mamdani’s question, I think the South faces a daunting task of replacing a new political order over the old one. There are clear signs that we will likely operate with the old system because most of our institutions such as the police, the ministry of labor, public service and judiciary are just an extension of the old order---not professional, premised on nepotism and crippled with graft. Although South Sudan had its own interim constitution which gave leeway to lawmakers to formulate policies and laws that could distinguish the South from her counterpart the North little was done and today the statute books read like the carbon copy of Khartoum’s laws. Already many ministries are in limbo. The Ministry of Labor and Public service has failed to streamline and manage the small numbers of Goss employees, which only requires a basic computer data base program to manage. Does it even require a Computer Science graduate? It’s very unlikely. The ministry resorted to the outdated system of filing documents and yet with the new technological age a simple computer program could archive these files for posterity. Why can’t we get the basics right if we are to move this country forward? The ministry has become a termite food centre where they can no longer go hungry but comfortably feed on the old files that have been dumped for years in the store. A university graduate earns salary that cannot sustain him/her for 15 days without considering the cost of living in Juba, which is the highest in the East African region. On the other hand, Police is just a duplication of Khartoum. Often brutal and with disregard to civil liberties, the police here sometimes appears like an appendage of Khartoum’s repressive arm. Is this what we need after Independence? According to the Constitution, English is the official language in the south but once again police is stick stuck in the old system. Apart from the fact that all police files are still in Arabic system, the few officers who are trained in English, for instance in the CID and Public security department have always been threatened that if they cannot learn Arabic then nobody would consider their reports. This shows how the nation is still being held at ransom. We should break the chains of Arabic bondage and move on as a new nation. And yet there are still many glaring weaknesses. For example its I find it innocuous that the Bank of southern Sudan has not employed any graduate who went to school in East Africa or elsewhere in the diaspora. For those of us who went to school in neighboring Uganda, Kenya and the greater Diaspora, are we not South Sudanese? A state should grant equal opportunity to its citizens and any kind of favoritism is a recipe for disaster. It was such a comical activity when documents for those who would be employed in the bank were taken to Khartoum for verification and only those who finished their studies in Sudan universities were endorsed. Those who studied outside were rejected. The Governor has conspicuously remained silent and yet the South boosts of great scholars who scaled the lofty heights at universities like Harvard, Oxford and Yale. Why do we deny our very own sons and daughters employment and encourage brain drain yet we need them now? I know I will continuously rattle some feathers but I must speak the truth. Finally the ministry of Foreign affairs is also riddled with error; our foreign policy framework was drawn by those who have worked for the Sudan foreign ministry. They are likely to design Sudan’s foreign policy for the south. As the lobbying intensifies those who were the ambassadors in Khartoum regime could likely out-compete their counterpart in the SPLA/M considering their competence. But Kiir should also consider a few new faces for Foreign Service. We shed blood to change the old Sudan system of governance into a progressively meaningful system that is against discrimination of any citizen, gives protection to their fundamental human rights regardless of their race, religion and tribe. If the government which has been in the bush for more than 22 years and in town for less than six years would ask its citizens to produce the academic qualifications alongside 10 years of experience, it does not only sound empty rhetoric but ridiculous. Mr. President, did SPLA/SPLM gain work experience at the treacherous battle front? Michael Thon Mangok is a journalist and social critic; [email protected] COMMENTS, PLEASE CLICK HERE Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author(s) and do not represent those of the website. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "JFD info" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/jfdinfo?hl=en.
