By Atok Dan Baguoot
It would be hard to judge what exactly SPLM is all about after it strenuously negotiated peace with NCP and still stood alongside its implementation with tough and soften tones of achieving the so called freedom of the oppressed held with clenched iron hands by oppressors. Further up the corridors of history, Sudanese have been oppressed by both outsiders and insiders and that should have been the reason why century wars were and are fought up to date.
In deciding our destiny in this country, several generations went to conflicts as a matter of addressing these curses levied upon peace loving Sudanese, but with a lot of futile attempts until the last and ultimate wave in the name of so called Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM) was born as a mass movement whose social base and numerical strengths were found within areas inhibited by those disgruntled by successive regimes in Khartoum.
SPLM was scrutinized and found to be most appropriate, functional and logical in its political viewpoint and argument based on its wider scope of handling this huge monster in Khartoum which has almost defeated the Sudanese people in their quest for a just, fair and equitable distribution of resources among the Sudanese in regard to their geographical whereabouts.
We called that as a wave of struggle of attaining one thing, but God given us freedom which had been denied to the Sudanese people. Thus, SPLM was jovially accepted as the right remedy by all classes of people in the Country with the exception of Arab northern part of the country where it was seen as usual madness made by Southerners as Arabs normally termed any unrest within the South. For any liberation struggle, it has to have its head and founders before it could become everyone affair or entity and SPLM had no exception. Late Dr. John Garang De Mabior (RIP) headed the Movement for two decades until his sudden death which came after he had signed a peace deal with Khartoum, bringing to an end the longest civil war on the continent.
In his peace speech, Late Garang said that the peace we are signing today will change Sudan forever and Sudan will never be the same again. Indeed, Sudan is undergoing winds of change and these are signified by April elections, peace negotiations in Darfur besides the awaiting referendum for the South and popular consultations for the people of Southern Blue Nile and South Kordofan.
With referendum, it is still some few kilometers away from us but what next door now is the election in which the country is gripped by its fever and flu especially among the political class whose fames are under severe and regular test. Leaders’ determined political future of a country, hence, when you find a confused nation/state like Sudan, it is attributed to poor leadership, and however, not all leaders are always confused in such a situation. There could be few who would wish to deliver though they can be denied access by their rivals.
In Short, I would like us to have a look at Salva Kiir Mayardit whose fate of the South is in hands according to Southern Sudanese as far now. Salva Kiir could be a rare breed of a politician who spent most of his life fighting for the freedom of oppressed. Hence, until now, you can not imagine that Kiir still owes the South a blick future for their children because he is the only one among his colleagues whom they founded the SPLM and whose millions lives were lost for what they thought to be rightful for their people.
Comparatively, it is like when United States of America (U.S. A) Went to polls in 2004 voting for whom to end wars in Middle East of which Iraq and Afghanistan are on topped list. The rift was between Republican President George W. Bush and Democratic competent candidate John Kerry. American voted for Bush because he was the one who initiated that war and they would be able to ask him what happened to their sons and daughters in the cold Arabian deserts.
Likewise here, Dr. Lam Akol could be seen as more competent compared to Salva Kiir but how will he answer our questions based on how our beloving sons and daughters lost their life in the last twenty years of war, yet he didn’t initiate it.
Let us vote for Salva Kiir so that he can answers our questions based on any aspects like lack of development yet our dear children and parents have sacrificed their precious bloods.
We will be able to hold him accountable in case he tends to do his personal things before he could take care of us.
Vote for him so that he can takes good care of our referendum whom they drafted so that we will be able to ask him in case it proves difficult because he is the only architect of the decision that let to demise of our citizens. Apart from that there is no way we can let SPLM rest in the dustbin of history before it could accomplish its mission of liberating the marginalized masses. Otherwise, SPLM will continue making noise with excuse of being short changed yet they would have done much if given time to put to an end their mission and to know the actual content of their store, let them take us to referendum or their store would always be full of promises that are never fulfilled.
Atok Dan is a journalist working with Southern Sudan Radio & TV and can be reached at atokfuture@gmail.com or spccsn@gmail.com . www.atokdan.blogspot.com
Friday, April 9, 2010
Wednesday, April 7, 2010
Let’s your vote not throttle the CPA
By Atok Dan
7th April. As the polls are next door, the major stumbling block amongst our political class is who to consult on what account so that immediate impact is created in the outcome of the polls. Politicians are not sleeping anymore because any inch of time that passes without proper account is deemed as loss of violable votes without knowing that voters themselves are too mobile to be trusted. War of heart beat and has tormented their chests-broken with mountains of wishes that if I knew I would have moved Tokyo overnight to my village in order to lure voters alongside my favour.
Awes and fears of losing in the elections have frightened both electorates and candidates especially among those whom power is the sole source of daily bread to the extent that whiz of blowing wind sounds to them likes a call for consensus in their fractured ears. Alas, time has come for the kingmakers to play their vital roles in adorning kings and queens for this rare feast hence, give in and out would be treated like nightmares or day dreaming whose circumstantial victims are yesterday’s beneficiaries whereas, the joyous parties are the usual kingmakers who had assumed the position of nocturnal creatures for so long.
Yap, time has drawn too closer to even leap behind but no way out, we are in for it so better tune your senses to the nucleus in order to salvage from the spilt milk or you render it go for those courageous human beings whose power has infested their physiological senses as part of normalcy.
It is intercepted from a reliable source that NCP has started clearing way bills for those voters distanced from Juba in exchange of votes and the associated repercussion would be that your democratic right will later emerged as something compromised at along conflicting loyalty of future and current short needs whereas, the immediate victims are the masses including you who have dared to pocketed blood money. Better live an honest live, a just and a free live than living wealthy while in absolute slavery. The choice of this simple equation is always personal. If there is something God has given freely and unconditionally, it is the choice between good and bad. There you are.
As the holder of a national treasury, none regrettable accounts for that matter is provided to cater and to iron down those few grey areas of rigidity in favour of NCP candidates and the target is you who stand firm in protecting your rights and rights of oppressed in the South, Blue Nile and Nuba Mountains. People prefer calling it bribery. In such a dreadful situation, monetary policy of accounting is compromised in the sense that neither accountability nor transparency outlining how such an amount of money was utilized remains unquestionable. Don’t mine that is how life is and there is never smooth road so long money exists.
Secondly, billions of Sudanese Pound is in circulation, spotting areas of soft and wicked and weak target to heal and mend those broken twists while rejuvenating and reinforcing their faded relationship for the sake of winning these elections as well as referendum to come.
The issue is neither sovereignty nor patriotism as they always emphasis in any public gathering but truth of the matter is that if we tell our pink albino brothers in the north that green mountains of Kimatong and Imatong plus fertile valleys of Renk and Aweil in addition to honey dark soil of Bentiu are yours, the whole of century rifts or bone of contention can just come to end overnight but without that impossible agreement, never relax and begin saying that North South boundary demarcation will happen on silver platter leave alone referendum to rest in its cage.
Because of this geographical misfortunate, continental drift remains the cause of all these resourced competitive problems between the Arabs and the black African because if the lands in northern Sudan had not sunk it bed turning the whole brown movable soil on top, Arabs would have settled without eyeing covetously on their Southern brothers’ lands. Although I don’t think if semi-nomadic Nilotic tribes would have left that land since it was the first soil they stepped upon when they first appeared in Sudan. Places like Khartoum, Shendi and Gezira Tut among others were grazing areas occupied by Dinka, Shilluk and Nuer before they could move Southward in search for greener environment.
My argument is substantiated by the fact that during the discovery of oil in Bentiu mid 1970s, and the launching of lucrative Aweil rice scheme, besides Renk plantations and that of Raja, a move was made by former president Gaffer Mohammed Nimeiry to annexed these resourceful areas to north but with stiff resistance among the Southern politicians and behind them their masses, the proposal died silently on presidential table without reaching the public scene. This actually relieve me from being seen as naïve and justifies the Arabs reasons for long quest to conquer the South on selfish account of lands and other subterranean resources like oil and gold along Boma and Kapoeta hills.
When one sees NCP renowned professors of lies preaching patriotism and lips singing slogan as in defend of this nation, behind it is always to fit into survival tactics and if they don’t do it openly in the name of Allah Akbar, a gap of doubt always exist prompting supposedly questions among their mental fixed populaces in the north. South Sudan was immunized against it long time ago so they find it hard to regurgitate their lies freely without being questions.
Thirdly, it is only in these historical elections according to world media that we are able to change that fixed procedural thinking in the minds of most northern Sudanese especially among the so called Arab descendants by turning out in large numbers and vote wholeheartedly without leniency or compromising that those of so and so will do the voting while me doing some other extra chores in my house. Remember that it is once and for all in this time allotted.
Remember that you are duty bound to turn up and participate in this exercise if there is something that God had kept you for up to this crucial moment. Your vote counts and your presence to observe and monitor those malpractices around polling centre is your free duty as a loyal citizen of the land. John F Kennedy said never ask for what this country can do for you but ask for what you can do to this country, therefore, it is our collective responsibility to cast our votes and not that only but wait until you see that your vote is counted without ambiguity.
Fourthly, it is your citizenry duty to be watchful around the polling centres to see that prophets of dooms and nocturnal human beings don’t meander around with their bloodiest money to bribe those weak hearted colleagues and undecided voters against the cause of the South. Remember that SPLM is not participating in elections in the north so voting NCP proxies here would amount to surrendering of your rights in either way which will throttle the referendum the only hope you were waiting all along.
Fifthly and final, your next voluntary responsibility is to let your eagle eyes on them they would cause violence in favour of their ill messenger to let the South back into sufferings where they are always appear as distanced tourists and only staring at flam when the South is on fire under the hands of their stooges and Southern defenders and beyond these the rest are egos because you are a complete human who has the definition of who you are meant for.
Atok Dan is a journalist working with Southern Sudan Radio & TV and can be reached at atokfuture@gmail.com, 0917221411 or visit www.atokdan.blogspot.com to read his writings on daily situation in Sudan.
7th April. As the polls are next door, the major stumbling block amongst our political class is who to consult on what account so that immediate impact is created in the outcome of the polls. Politicians are not sleeping anymore because any inch of time that passes without proper account is deemed as loss of violable votes without knowing that voters themselves are too mobile to be trusted. War of heart beat and has tormented their chests-broken with mountains of wishes that if I knew I would have moved Tokyo overnight to my village in order to lure voters alongside my favour.
Awes and fears of losing in the elections have frightened both electorates and candidates especially among those whom power is the sole source of daily bread to the extent that whiz of blowing wind sounds to them likes a call for consensus in their fractured ears. Alas, time has come for the kingmakers to play their vital roles in adorning kings and queens for this rare feast hence, give in and out would be treated like nightmares or day dreaming whose circumstantial victims are yesterday’s beneficiaries whereas, the joyous parties are the usual kingmakers who had assumed the position of nocturnal creatures for so long.
Yap, time has drawn too closer to even leap behind but no way out, we are in for it so better tune your senses to the nucleus in order to salvage from the spilt milk or you render it go for those courageous human beings whose power has infested their physiological senses as part of normalcy.
It is intercepted from a reliable source that NCP has started clearing way bills for those voters distanced from Juba in exchange of votes and the associated repercussion would be that your democratic right will later emerged as something compromised at along conflicting loyalty of future and current short needs whereas, the immediate victims are the masses including you who have dared to pocketed blood money. Better live an honest live, a just and a free live than living wealthy while in absolute slavery. The choice of this simple equation is always personal. If there is something God has given freely and unconditionally, it is the choice between good and bad. There you are.
As the holder of a national treasury, none regrettable accounts for that matter is provided to cater and to iron down those few grey areas of rigidity in favour of NCP candidates and the target is you who stand firm in protecting your rights and rights of oppressed in the South, Blue Nile and Nuba Mountains. People prefer calling it bribery. In such a dreadful situation, monetary policy of accounting is compromised in the sense that neither accountability nor transparency outlining how such an amount of money was utilized remains unquestionable. Don’t mine that is how life is and there is never smooth road so long money exists.
Secondly, billions of Sudanese Pound is in circulation, spotting areas of soft and wicked and weak target to heal and mend those broken twists while rejuvenating and reinforcing their faded relationship for the sake of winning these elections as well as referendum to come.
The issue is neither sovereignty nor patriotism as they always emphasis in any public gathering but truth of the matter is that if we tell our pink albino brothers in the north that green mountains of Kimatong and Imatong plus fertile valleys of Renk and Aweil in addition to honey dark soil of Bentiu are yours, the whole of century rifts or bone of contention can just come to end overnight but without that impossible agreement, never relax and begin saying that North South boundary demarcation will happen on silver platter leave alone referendum to rest in its cage.
Because of this geographical misfortunate, continental drift remains the cause of all these resourced competitive problems between the Arabs and the black African because if the lands in northern Sudan had not sunk it bed turning the whole brown movable soil on top, Arabs would have settled without eyeing covetously on their Southern brothers’ lands. Although I don’t think if semi-nomadic Nilotic tribes would have left that land since it was the first soil they stepped upon when they first appeared in Sudan. Places like Khartoum, Shendi and Gezira Tut among others were grazing areas occupied by Dinka, Shilluk and Nuer before they could move Southward in search for greener environment.
My argument is substantiated by the fact that during the discovery of oil in Bentiu mid 1970s, and the launching of lucrative Aweil rice scheme, besides Renk plantations and that of Raja, a move was made by former president Gaffer Mohammed Nimeiry to annexed these resourceful areas to north but with stiff resistance among the Southern politicians and behind them their masses, the proposal died silently on presidential table without reaching the public scene. This actually relieve me from being seen as naïve and justifies the Arabs reasons for long quest to conquer the South on selfish account of lands and other subterranean resources like oil and gold along Boma and Kapoeta hills.
When one sees NCP renowned professors of lies preaching patriotism and lips singing slogan as in defend of this nation, behind it is always to fit into survival tactics and if they don’t do it openly in the name of Allah Akbar, a gap of doubt always exist prompting supposedly questions among their mental fixed populaces in the north. South Sudan was immunized against it long time ago so they find it hard to regurgitate their lies freely without being questions.
Thirdly, it is only in these historical elections according to world media that we are able to change that fixed procedural thinking in the minds of most northern Sudanese especially among the so called Arab descendants by turning out in large numbers and vote wholeheartedly without leniency or compromising that those of so and so will do the voting while me doing some other extra chores in my house. Remember that it is once and for all in this time allotted.
Remember that you are duty bound to turn up and participate in this exercise if there is something that God had kept you for up to this crucial moment. Your vote counts and your presence to observe and monitor those malpractices around polling centre is your free duty as a loyal citizen of the land. John F Kennedy said never ask for what this country can do for you but ask for what you can do to this country, therefore, it is our collective responsibility to cast our votes and not that only but wait until you see that your vote is counted without ambiguity.
Fourthly, it is your citizenry duty to be watchful around the polling centres to see that prophets of dooms and nocturnal human beings don’t meander around with their bloodiest money to bribe those weak hearted colleagues and undecided voters against the cause of the South. Remember that SPLM is not participating in elections in the north so voting NCP proxies here would amount to surrendering of your rights in either way which will throttle the referendum the only hope you were waiting all along.
Fifthly and final, your next voluntary responsibility is to let your eagle eyes on them they would cause violence in favour of their ill messenger to let the South back into sufferings where they are always appear as distanced tourists and only staring at flam when the South is on fire under the hands of their stooges and Southern defenders and beyond these the rest are egos because you are a complete human who has the definition of who you are meant for.
Atok Dan is a journalist working with Southern Sudan Radio & TV and can be reached at atokfuture@gmail.com, 0917221411 or visit www.atokdan.blogspot.com to read his writings on daily situation in Sudan.
Where are the SPLA veterans?
By Atok Dan
“A nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people,” John F. Kennedy.
There is always a need to travel thousand miles beyond our simple perceptions and to meditate beyond our seeing in order to discover somewhere, where our objectives of the revolution went missing and to rediscover why we are so naïve and myopic to the course of our struggles as a nation endowed with greatness not discovered. In this defining moment, there is a need for massive support for our government whenever possible and there is need for massive uprising to up root all possible sources which contravene with original objectives of the Movement we wholeheartedly nursed during those nasty and nostalgic hours of isolation and boredom. And there is a need to redefine ourselves in this trying moment in order to rejuvenate our worn-out ideas for the sake of generation and generations. Having gone to bush at a younger age, am an ambassador of Liberation more than what most politicians think of who am I. In fact, what the marginalized Sudanese in all the peripherals of the country need is more than negative political rhetoric normally made in rallies in the name of winning supports.
In fact, the two years which preceded the uprising of the 1983 were so symbolic and noticeable in such a way that body communication was enough to rely the magnitude of the flaming fire in most Southerners including people from the three areas. What I would want us to remember is that we are not that race with short memories to have forgotten the recent past whom we are still nursing from the wounds incurred, who are indeed myopic to have proved scrambling over the little slide-piece of breed given by the enemy. “Peace is a daily, a weekly, a monthly process, gradually changing opinions, slowly eroding old barriers, quietly building new structures, said John F. Kennedy.” If that very spirit was persistent in us, corruption, the grandfather of nepotism, tribalism and an uncle to rampant insecurity over this tiny piece of land won’t exist but I think it could be because our memories are too short to recall the yesterdays which brought us to today of remorse and regrets.
I’m intending to talk to my uncles, elder brothers, sisters heading the train driving the marginalized to the promised land that this very government we brought from land of deceits is too corrupt, naïve to accommodate us, too weak to foster hope in the hopeless orphans, widows and the crippled heroes and heroines maimed during the struggle and that you are obliged to adapt some reformations which I know your are potential to achieve but only that you might have been not told. That’s your greatness to drive this nation out of danger is inevitable given that the population is behind you.
my next take to the disgruntled masses is that, there‘s never existed corruption, tribalism, nepotism and many other vices in the government but the few seen are the results of your contributions. Nobody has ever dared to criticize his/her relative because of making the government office as their family dynasty in the name of fairness and patriotism. Judge me wrong if all office managers, drivers of officials and other crucial positions are not occupied by sons/daughters or immediate family members. It is very simple to be corrupt than to be fair. Although there is one mechanism which if employed can seal off all possible avenues of corruption and its relatives in a country brought about through just wish. This mechanism is through democratic means by electing leaders mandated in the name of serving people not themselves anymore. Lastly, we need not to commit mistake done by postcolonial Sudan that people had much trust in their leaders yet only few of those leaders honoured the trust paid to them. Winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, Prof Wangari Maathai said, “Africa needs a revolution in leadership not only from the politicians who govern, but from an active citizenry that places the country above the narrow needs of its own ethnic group or community through collective responsibility over individual gains and common feeling of the continent.” We need our politicians to be active in advocating for positive change not only supporting transparency but must be reflected in their behaviours. Please SPLA veterans, the ball is still rolling in the firearms front as the LRA and other organized gangs still active. Where are you and your gallant spirit to rescue, stand tall against the hijackers of the movement the enemies of your work.
He is an employee of Southern Sudan Radio and can be reached at atokfuture@gmail.com
“A nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people,” John F. Kennedy.
There is always a need to travel thousand miles beyond our simple perceptions and to meditate beyond our seeing in order to discover somewhere, where our objectives of the revolution went missing and to rediscover why we are so naïve and myopic to the course of our struggles as a nation endowed with greatness not discovered. In this defining moment, there is a need for massive support for our government whenever possible and there is need for massive uprising to up root all possible sources which contravene with original objectives of the Movement we wholeheartedly nursed during those nasty and nostalgic hours of isolation and boredom. And there is a need to redefine ourselves in this trying moment in order to rejuvenate our worn-out ideas for the sake of generation and generations. Having gone to bush at a younger age, am an ambassador of Liberation more than what most politicians think of who am I. In fact, what the marginalized Sudanese in all the peripherals of the country need is more than negative political rhetoric normally made in rallies in the name of winning supports.
In fact, the two years which preceded the uprising of the 1983 were so symbolic and noticeable in such a way that body communication was enough to rely the magnitude of the flaming fire in most Southerners including people from the three areas. What I would want us to remember is that we are not that race with short memories to have forgotten the recent past whom we are still nursing from the wounds incurred, who are indeed myopic to have proved scrambling over the little slide-piece of breed given by the enemy. “Peace is a daily, a weekly, a monthly process, gradually changing opinions, slowly eroding old barriers, quietly building new structures, said John F. Kennedy.” If that very spirit was persistent in us, corruption, the grandfather of nepotism, tribalism and an uncle to rampant insecurity over this tiny piece of land won’t exist but I think it could be because our memories are too short to recall the yesterdays which brought us to today of remorse and regrets.
I’m intending to talk to my uncles, elder brothers, sisters heading the train driving the marginalized to the promised land that this very government we brought from land of deceits is too corrupt, naïve to accommodate us, too weak to foster hope in the hopeless orphans, widows and the crippled heroes and heroines maimed during the struggle and that you are obliged to adapt some reformations which I know your are potential to achieve but only that you might have been not told. That’s your greatness to drive this nation out of danger is inevitable given that the population is behind you.
my next take to the disgruntled masses is that, there‘s never existed corruption, tribalism, nepotism and many other vices in the government but the few seen are the results of your contributions. Nobody has ever dared to criticize his/her relative because of making the government office as their family dynasty in the name of fairness and patriotism. Judge me wrong if all office managers, drivers of officials and other crucial positions are not occupied by sons/daughters or immediate family members. It is very simple to be corrupt than to be fair. Although there is one mechanism which if employed can seal off all possible avenues of corruption and its relatives in a country brought about through just wish. This mechanism is through democratic means by electing leaders mandated in the name of serving people not themselves anymore. Lastly, we need not to commit mistake done by postcolonial Sudan that people had much trust in their leaders yet only few of those leaders honoured the trust paid to them. Winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, Prof Wangari Maathai said, “Africa needs a revolution in leadership not only from the politicians who govern, but from an active citizenry that places the country above the narrow needs of its own ethnic group or community through collective responsibility over individual gains and common feeling of the continent.” We need our politicians to be active in advocating for positive change not only supporting transparency but must be reflected in their behaviours. Please SPLA veterans, the ball is still rolling in the firearms front as the LRA and other organized gangs still active. Where are you and your gallant spirit to rescue, stand tall against the hijackers of the movement the enemies of your work.
He is an employee of Southern Sudan Radio and can be reached at atokfuture@gmail.com
What is this vague unity all about?
By Atok Dan Baguoot
“I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended upon to meet any national crisis. The great point is to bring them the real facts”.
Juba, 3rdApril. Having learned a lot from all unbelievable cruel deeds done to us in the last 50 years of Sudan’s Independence and count back to historical backdates in those dark hours of colonial periods when South and other areas inhabited by black Africans were still under Closed District Ordinance administration to Juba 1947 two days conference where the South forged marriage of convenience with the North. Those were years of learning from nursery, primary to secondary schools and university in analyzing what is all funny with vague unity or force marriage in which the kids born by the couples are too old to attend to themselves. It is always a mind bothering question if one is to go the normal vertical thinking trends in relation to current looming political rationale of this mismanaged vast piece of land on the face of the continent of Africa.
This is a country that will never agree to itself beyond normal human thinking even if our smooth tongue politicians are trying to buy time in persuading masses to deface their present sights of viewing the whole matter in its current ruinous state. There are people beyond our life time who never knew that peace is exact but not only found on paper as the case here in Sudan. These are those whom the future belongs but not the politicians who have failed this country for almost a century yet none is admittance to the mistakes done to ourselves.
For those of you who are Christians, God never got angry to those of Adam and Eve on the fact that they ate that fictitious Biblical tree but on the fact that none of them admitted to have eaten the fruit. When God asked Adam if he has eaten the fruit, he never answered yes but weighed the whole issue on the woman God himself provided likewise, Eve went on blaming God of Serpent he has placed in the Garden until serpent who didn’t exchange blame to anyone but I think if there was a fourth party he would have done it also. What I’m trying to tell you and I is that, our Northern colleagues whom the whole issue rested upon their shoulders are ever in defensive moods; wanted even to add more weighs on the existing messes they have created.
As a person familiar with this old existing game of deceits from a certain direction, we better go for another option because we had been deceived for so long such that enough can emerge as the best term to described it by saying enough is either too enough. An English language adage says, if a man deceives once, sham on him if twice sham on me because it is a sham on me I who is able to be deceived twice. So our deception by Northern brothers is too enough.
We as people with distinctive cultures, distinctive languages, norms, values, believes, colour, and even distinctive physique as well as wizard that represents our political ideologies, we can better suffer on our own instead of always crying faults while pointing accusatory fingers to their praying direction. It is better to be cheated by our own political wizards than being always prey to an individual whose terms thereto are unique in the name of forging this natural unstable parasitic existence in a very vast ecosystem where any of us can stay without bothering each others.
Due to all these political inconvenience, entrusting our affairs to those whose political allegiances is questionable was and is a deadly decision ever taken by anyone on this planet unless that person who opted for such a decision is naturally half like us in Southern Sudan and other marginalised peripherals in the Sudan. We are half because we refused to identify ourselves and even refused to forge our own economic stand simply because there are people somewhere wanted to be consulted first before you can name your child born tonight. This actually falls within the description of enemy and total slavery as defined by the SPLM in its manifesto of July 1984.
Books and big volumes have been written by many scholars on the relationship between the North, South and marginalised areas in plain language of calling spade a spade but not big spoon, yet our numbed senses couldn’t tolerate to interpret why all these foreign scholars see things within us far away when we cannot see them. Dinkas say what a child cannot see while standing can be seen by an elder seated. Even our elders don’t see things while standing today because they would have seen all tricks by NCP and advise young one to be cautious of foreign intruders. Arabs and Africans are foreigners to themselves and there is no way you can make them become one and not even the best scientists of the modern era have succeeded in doing it.
Unless when we want to abuse the nature, Arabisation and Islamisation philosophy can become realities in the Sudan. with traditional and primitive weapons, Anya Nya 1 succeeded in defending territorial integrity of the South until historical Addis Ababa 1972 peace agreement was signed when the Sudan Army with sophisticated weapons could annihilate disorganized and an unprofessional Anya Nya soldiers. Not we to be either Arabised or Islamized with equivalent weapons.
SPLM with meager resources also ventured through until CPA we are enjoying today came to what most redundant northern politicians confusing us on in its implementations. Not even a single old mum or dad in the villages of Southern Sudan has awaken up, asking for compensation of his/her lost son in the battle yet our learned colleagues are going here and there confusing people in the name of vote for NCP. I thought we would be talking the tongue of vote for the SPLM so that we obtain what had been denied us for century.
Qualitatively, I doubt the kind of education given by Arabs to Southern Sudanese and other marginalised black Africans in their northern universities. One time I told a friend of mind in a casual discussion that if Dr. Garang graduated in Khartoum University, he would have retreated in the battle like the rest of his graduate colleagues who deserted the battle fields for Khartoum. I refused to go to Juba University in Khartoum when Southern Students from East Africa were granted that privileged. In fact, it is not the education acquired in the North which is the problem but the way Arabs subdued Southerners is what I didn’t like because I was ideologically different given my backgrounds. “Whatever spoken within a reach of a child turn to the formation of a character of that child”, I refused Khartoum-Juba University until is brought home.
Be aware that any political destiny determined in the north in our names in the South here, worth none of a support in the South and that’s why SPLM-DC is just like shoe brush in the eyes and minds of normal Southerners. If there are people to sue to court of law because of our wasted youth and childhood happiness, it is those Southern politicians who opted to affiliate to north in determining our political fate. If there is anyone outside there who still holds on those Arabs fallacy of Southerners unable to manage their affairs, tonight is your answer to evacuate from that well calculated negative statement of subduing your senses to their control.
Since none of us can reverse his/her past but all of us able to change our future, tonight is your turn to reverse your fixed thinking of yourself because you had been in the den of lion and that you can be a complete independent being for you were created to as independent without cost. These elections whose process is rigged is soon coming to past therefore, your target is the referendum in which you will determine your political destiny. Late Dr. John Garang De Mabior said if you opted to continue as second class in your own country, it is absolutely yours.
Enough is enough, so let SPLM runs by our own brothers and sisters be the one to do those bad things to us if we really liked to be mistreated forever and ever. Otherwise, time has come for the old to listen to young because the old is too old to be listened to. Both history and contemporary events have taught us such that we hardly be deceived. Northern born SPLM-DC of renowned politician Dr. Lam Akol is one of those ancient north sponsored programs of setting South in disarray.
Indeed, events that took place in the government of Southern Sudan after its inception were really unexpected because these were actually characteristics of Old Sudan hence, deserve transformation but they don’t need someone to be sponsored in the North. If Dr. Lam had stayed in the South after he lost Foreign Ministry portfolio and form SPLM-DC in the South, he would have been the right option to correct them but when he extended his tentacles to North for blessings, Southerners see Bashir in the big picture of Lam. Beyond that, Dr. Akol remains as a great thinker and a liberator who only missed to take child to its rightful and supposed birth place.
Not even a stupid politician can form a political party as an option for the purpose of the South in the North and thinks of garner huge supports when you know very well that out traditional minds set towards the north is so negative that even blinds and deaf can see and hear. What happened to Dr. Akol can be compared to as adding table salt onto acid as a solution to stomach ulcers and sit back expecting your patient to cope with the treatment. Because of the North, Sudan Africa Closed District Union (SACDU), Sudan African National Union SANU, Nile Provincial Government NPG and SPLM/A and many other splinter groups that did not work were formed. Of cause, Nasir group, SPLM United, SSIM and so many others are living examples of war against the north. Children were orphaned and widows plus many malfunctioning incidences have occurred in between the Arab North South political relationship and that’s why somebody like me can have a lot to say.
Any outcast politician in the South is the one that affiliated with the north whereas; the best politician is the one who stood pressuring ground while advocating for the South in the South despite his intellect. If Dr. Lam had done that, disgruntled masses in the SPLM like the Independents, plus many others who felt rigged off in the recent Political Bureau nominations including me would have flocked to SPLM-DC camp for political settlement.
Atok Dan is a journalist working for Southern Sudan Radio and TV and can be reached at atokfuture@gmail.com
“I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended upon to meet any national crisis. The great point is to bring them the real facts”.
Juba, 3rdApril. Having learned a lot from all unbelievable cruel deeds done to us in the last 50 years of Sudan’s Independence and count back to historical backdates in those dark hours of colonial periods when South and other areas inhabited by black Africans were still under Closed District Ordinance administration to Juba 1947 two days conference where the South forged marriage of convenience with the North. Those were years of learning from nursery, primary to secondary schools and university in analyzing what is all funny with vague unity or force marriage in which the kids born by the couples are too old to attend to themselves. It is always a mind bothering question if one is to go the normal vertical thinking trends in relation to current looming political rationale of this mismanaged vast piece of land on the face of the continent of Africa.
This is a country that will never agree to itself beyond normal human thinking even if our smooth tongue politicians are trying to buy time in persuading masses to deface their present sights of viewing the whole matter in its current ruinous state. There are people beyond our life time who never knew that peace is exact but not only found on paper as the case here in Sudan. These are those whom the future belongs but not the politicians who have failed this country for almost a century yet none is admittance to the mistakes done to ourselves.
For those of you who are Christians, God never got angry to those of Adam and Eve on the fact that they ate that fictitious Biblical tree but on the fact that none of them admitted to have eaten the fruit. When God asked Adam if he has eaten the fruit, he never answered yes but weighed the whole issue on the woman God himself provided likewise, Eve went on blaming God of Serpent he has placed in the Garden until serpent who didn’t exchange blame to anyone but I think if there was a fourth party he would have done it also. What I’m trying to tell you and I is that, our Northern colleagues whom the whole issue rested upon their shoulders are ever in defensive moods; wanted even to add more weighs on the existing messes they have created.
As a person familiar with this old existing game of deceits from a certain direction, we better go for another option because we had been deceived for so long such that enough can emerge as the best term to described it by saying enough is either too enough. An English language adage says, if a man deceives once, sham on him if twice sham on me because it is a sham on me I who is able to be deceived twice. So our deception by Northern brothers is too enough.
We as people with distinctive cultures, distinctive languages, norms, values, believes, colour, and even distinctive physique as well as wizard that represents our political ideologies, we can better suffer on our own instead of always crying faults while pointing accusatory fingers to their praying direction. It is better to be cheated by our own political wizards than being always prey to an individual whose terms thereto are unique in the name of forging this natural unstable parasitic existence in a very vast ecosystem where any of us can stay without bothering each others.
Due to all these political inconvenience, entrusting our affairs to those whose political allegiances is questionable was and is a deadly decision ever taken by anyone on this planet unless that person who opted for such a decision is naturally half like us in Southern Sudan and other marginalised peripherals in the Sudan. We are half because we refused to identify ourselves and even refused to forge our own economic stand simply because there are people somewhere wanted to be consulted first before you can name your child born tonight. This actually falls within the description of enemy and total slavery as defined by the SPLM in its manifesto of July 1984.
Books and big volumes have been written by many scholars on the relationship between the North, South and marginalised areas in plain language of calling spade a spade but not big spoon, yet our numbed senses couldn’t tolerate to interpret why all these foreign scholars see things within us far away when we cannot see them. Dinkas say what a child cannot see while standing can be seen by an elder seated. Even our elders don’t see things while standing today because they would have seen all tricks by NCP and advise young one to be cautious of foreign intruders. Arabs and Africans are foreigners to themselves and there is no way you can make them become one and not even the best scientists of the modern era have succeeded in doing it.
Unless when we want to abuse the nature, Arabisation and Islamisation philosophy can become realities in the Sudan. with traditional and primitive weapons, Anya Nya 1 succeeded in defending territorial integrity of the South until historical Addis Ababa 1972 peace agreement was signed when the Sudan Army with sophisticated weapons could annihilate disorganized and an unprofessional Anya Nya soldiers. Not we to be either Arabised or Islamized with equivalent weapons.
SPLM with meager resources also ventured through until CPA we are enjoying today came to what most redundant northern politicians confusing us on in its implementations. Not even a single old mum or dad in the villages of Southern Sudan has awaken up, asking for compensation of his/her lost son in the battle yet our learned colleagues are going here and there confusing people in the name of vote for NCP. I thought we would be talking the tongue of vote for the SPLM so that we obtain what had been denied us for century.
Qualitatively, I doubt the kind of education given by Arabs to Southern Sudanese and other marginalised black Africans in their northern universities. One time I told a friend of mind in a casual discussion that if Dr. Garang graduated in Khartoum University, he would have retreated in the battle like the rest of his graduate colleagues who deserted the battle fields for Khartoum. I refused to go to Juba University in Khartoum when Southern Students from East Africa were granted that privileged. In fact, it is not the education acquired in the North which is the problem but the way Arabs subdued Southerners is what I didn’t like because I was ideologically different given my backgrounds. “Whatever spoken within a reach of a child turn to the formation of a character of that child”, I refused Khartoum-Juba University until is brought home.
Be aware that any political destiny determined in the north in our names in the South here, worth none of a support in the South and that’s why SPLM-DC is just like shoe brush in the eyes and minds of normal Southerners. If there are people to sue to court of law because of our wasted youth and childhood happiness, it is those Southern politicians who opted to affiliate to north in determining our political fate. If there is anyone outside there who still holds on those Arabs fallacy of Southerners unable to manage their affairs, tonight is your answer to evacuate from that well calculated negative statement of subduing your senses to their control.
Since none of us can reverse his/her past but all of us able to change our future, tonight is your turn to reverse your fixed thinking of yourself because you had been in the den of lion and that you can be a complete independent being for you were created to as independent without cost. These elections whose process is rigged is soon coming to past therefore, your target is the referendum in which you will determine your political destiny. Late Dr. John Garang De Mabior said if you opted to continue as second class in your own country, it is absolutely yours.
Enough is enough, so let SPLM runs by our own brothers and sisters be the one to do those bad things to us if we really liked to be mistreated forever and ever. Otherwise, time has come for the old to listen to young because the old is too old to be listened to. Both history and contemporary events have taught us such that we hardly be deceived. Northern born SPLM-DC of renowned politician Dr. Lam Akol is one of those ancient north sponsored programs of setting South in disarray.
Indeed, events that took place in the government of Southern Sudan after its inception were really unexpected because these were actually characteristics of Old Sudan hence, deserve transformation but they don’t need someone to be sponsored in the North. If Dr. Lam had stayed in the South after he lost Foreign Ministry portfolio and form SPLM-DC in the South, he would have been the right option to correct them but when he extended his tentacles to North for blessings, Southerners see Bashir in the big picture of Lam. Beyond that, Dr. Akol remains as a great thinker and a liberator who only missed to take child to its rightful and supposed birth place.
Not even a stupid politician can form a political party as an option for the purpose of the South in the North and thinks of garner huge supports when you know very well that out traditional minds set towards the north is so negative that even blinds and deaf can see and hear. What happened to Dr. Akol can be compared to as adding table salt onto acid as a solution to stomach ulcers and sit back expecting your patient to cope with the treatment. Because of the North, Sudan Africa Closed District Union (SACDU), Sudan African National Union SANU, Nile Provincial Government NPG and SPLM/A and many other splinter groups that did not work were formed. Of cause, Nasir group, SPLM United, SSIM and so many others are living examples of war against the north. Children were orphaned and widows plus many malfunctioning incidences have occurred in between the Arab North South political relationship and that’s why somebody like me can have a lot to say.
Any outcast politician in the South is the one that affiliated with the north whereas; the best politician is the one who stood pressuring ground while advocating for the South in the South despite his intellect. If Dr. Lam had done that, disgruntled masses in the SPLM like the Independents, plus many others who felt rigged off in the recent Political Bureau nominations including me would have flocked to SPLM-DC camp for political settlement.
Atok Dan is a journalist working for Southern Sudan Radio and TV and can be reached at atokfuture@gmail.com
Intermittent discrimination of public service vehicles along Wazarat road in Juba town
By Atok Dan Baguoot.
Public transport sector in major towns in Southern Sudan is always a headache especially during the rush hours more so in Juba town where almost 80% of the roads are undergoing maintenance and tarmacking, given the normal traffic police duty in providing decent security protection to our VIPs and other credential visitors of the South who normal need special services when on the road. Wazarat road links Juba town with Konyokonyo, Ministries and other busy trading centres in Juba. It is the only service providing pathway which can ease public and private businesses in term of quick service delivery in the autonomous capital.
As a poor young nation that has just emerged out of the longest war on the continent, almost 98% of Juba population lack personal vehicles which facilitate faster transport to their daily workplaces hence, public service vehicles (psv) are highly use regardless of social status. According to GoSS Labour and Public Services Ministry the normal working minute starts at 8:30am -5:00pm and within that time allocated all workforces have to click in at that very time so that you end up having worked for eight hours at the end of the day.
The regular stressful experience on Wazarat road in Juba is the intermittent discrimination of public vehicles on that very road in the name of providing security to VIPs. Public buses are denied the use of the road especially during the rush hours which normally resulted into late reporting to workplaces whose effect is reduced performance in economical logical viewpoint. There is a need for decent protection of our VIPs given the dominance of terrorism and terror minded activities all over the globe, and also to offer them special time as their calendars are occupied, but there is also a need to weigh yield of combined efforts exerted by the entire public whose success in the economy depends shall be judged.
Public service vehicles users formed 95% of our workers hence, their contribution is also 95% and this is a fact of reality if we are to liberate ourselves economically in order to realize total freedom. Hoisting our beautiful flag higher above the sea level is just an inch unless our efforts on market go higher than that and the barometer of determining it, is efficient transport system. We need time and road apportionment. Signals of VIPs motorcades are enough to make public buses offer safe passage for our beloved leaders unlike putting total barricades for some hours in the name of offering safe journey. It has a quality of discrimination because while prohibiting public service buses, GoSS numbered cars and other private motorists do go simultaneously while offering space for VIPs motorcades to penetrate. Here, it doesn’t make sense when we want to talk in term of security provision to VIPs.
To me these private motorists/cars pose more threats than even public vehicle frustrated travelers battling with life to ensure that bread is availed on the table of his/her family at the end of the day and denying them quick travel their markets/workplaces at times is like depriving them oxygen. Lastly, traffic police have to patrol to monitor the movements of these economic crucial sectors without subjecting to them to high time. I’m a traveler of the said department and I normally find it hard to tolerate because my normal morning plan is to get to my work in time with a lot of ease.
Atok Dan is a journalist working with Southern Sudan radio and can be reached at atokfuture@gmail.com
Public transport sector in major towns in Southern Sudan is always a headache especially during the rush hours more so in Juba town where almost 80% of the roads are undergoing maintenance and tarmacking, given the normal traffic police duty in providing decent security protection to our VIPs and other credential visitors of the South who normal need special services when on the road. Wazarat road links Juba town with Konyokonyo, Ministries and other busy trading centres in Juba. It is the only service providing pathway which can ease public and private businesses in term of quick service delivery in the autonomous capital.
As a poor young nation that has just emerged out of the longest war on the continent, almost 98% of Juba population lack personal vehicles which facilitate faster transport to their daily workplaces hence, public service vehicles (psv) are highly use regardless of social status. According to GoSS Labour and Public Services Ministry the normal working minute starts at 8:30am -5:00pm and within that time allocated all workforces have to click in at that very time so that you end up having worked for eight hours at the end of the day.
The regular stressful experience on Wazarat road in Juba is the intermittent discrimination of public vehicles on that very road in the name of providing security to VIPs. Public buses are denied the use of the road especially during the rush hours which normally resulted into late reporting to workplaces whose effect is reduced performance in economical logical viewpoint. There is a need for decent protection of our VIPs given the dominance of terrorism and terror minded activities all over the globe, and also to offer them special time as their calendars are occupied, but there is also a need to weigh yield of combined efforts exerted by the entire public whose success in the economy depends shall be judged.
Public service vehicles users formed 95% of our workers hence, their contribution is also 95% and this is a fact of reality if we are to liberate ourselves economically in order to realize total freedom. Hoisting our beautiful flag higher above the sea level is just an inch unless our efforts on market go higher than that and the barometer of determining it, is efficient transport system. We need time and road apportionment. Signals of VIPs motorcades are enough to make public buses offer safe passage for our beloved leaders unlike putting total barricades for some hours in the name of offering safe journey. It has a quality of discrimination because while prohibiting public service buses, GoSS numbered cars and other private motorists do go simultaneously while offering space for VIPs motorcades to penetrate. Here, it doesn’t make sense when we want to talk in term of security provision to VIPs.
To me these private motorists/cars pose more threats than even public vehicle frustrated travelers battling with life to ensure that bread is availed on the table of his/her family at the end of the day and denying them quick travel their markets/workplaces at times is like depriving them oxygen. Lastly, traffic police have to patrol to monitor the movements of these economic crucial sectors without subjecting to them to high time. I’m a traveler of the said department and I normally find it hard to tolerate because my normal morning plan is to get to my work in time with a lot of ease.
Atok Dan is a journalist working with Southern Sudan radio and can be reached at atokfuture@gmail.com
Let war be history in these elections
By Atok Dan Baguoot
“In the democracy of the dead all men at last are equal. There is neither rank nor station nor prerogative in the republic of the grave”
Voting for SPLM in these elections would be a definite genesis of second liberation for Northern marginalised, Islamized and Arabised African Sudanese that were not directly or indirectly involved in the two decades war of liberation fought in Southern Sudan of which other exposed peripherals like Southern Blue, Nuba Mountains as well as eastern fronts participated. In fact, debates heated up the atmosphere between the SPLM and the National Congress Party NCP during the 2008 Sudan Fifth Household Census on the questions of Ethnicity and religion with consistent stance by the SPLM to overhaul the questionnaires of inclusivity of questions on ethnicity and creeds, besides demographic facts.
In every Census, there are predominant factors considered why census ought to be carried out in any nation especially in rare cases where civil population was partially involved in protracted wars and massive migrations whether be it internal or external displacement like the case of Sudan. It is always a global assumption that lives were lost and children were born in continuity of normal live but with intention of equating death to birth rate, besides emphasis on how conflicts affected normal traditional settlements of the people hereafter long unrest, census is always preferred to establish facts.
Sudan is never exceptional because civil population was displaced, lives were lost and traditional economic aspect of the people was in ruin leaving the rural population in total destitute, and in economic disarrays. Urban settlements were overhauled as the population moved to safer zones for periodical safeguards.
Today, major towns in northern Sudan outburst as the population shot up in the shortest time opposed to normal population growth given the fact that this very rural population urban and migration was forceful and given the deplorable conditions in which they are subject to, societies, communities and individuals end up bending some of their traditional norms and customs to forge a new way of survival in that new environment and hence, assimilations through marriages of conveniences resulted into half breed offspring whose identities remain loyal to economic muscular individuals.
The victims of such unintended ploy were Black African tribes in both the South and the North and whose social being were disrupted by social injustices as well as cross cultural settlement patterns. Their daughters went for light skinned or Afro Arab men for the sake of survival because these men were historically privileged on the expenses of oppressed Africans.
These were reasons why questions of ethnicity and religion were thrashed off as a matter of denying the true natural account of what this unfortunate country faceted. With a false preaching in Northern Sudan pronouncing this country as both Arab and Islamic state, these facts would have prevailed wrong in the previous census if the two components of ethnicity and religion were answered in the exercise. Now Sudan remains an Arab and Islamic state because of political dishonesty through genocidal procedures. Force displacement, trickery assimilation and economic tortures amount to genocide in one way or the other.
People loss their cultures, land and even direct torturing and killings which deprived them of their cultural prides, subjecting them into a state of cultural inferiority or even seeing themselves either a weak race or society, based on these silent intended strategies. But because these very people still have that cultural egos not completely deleted in them, the Arabs reinforce the strategy through a force like by inculcating into them rejection, self identification, giving them Islamic names and a forced believe. For the case of Sudan, Islamic names and believes were enforced in substitute of their African norms and believes.
In order to break these cycles, it is only possible through voting in SPLM in these elections so that a new political dispensation is created to provide equal opportunities to all the Sudanese people who are oppressed for so long. As a political force founded among the oppressed and none privileged Sudanese, it is ready to awaken our recess genes in recalling who we are exactly. It is called self recognition.
Having stayed in slavery for a period older than my thirty years on earth, these black Africans actually need a concept of total liberation to dominate their gone to recess genes so that they are able to stand tall in their persons and communities to revive and rejuvenate their cultures minus the conditionally acquired Arab cultures.
Voting SPLM to be the dominant party in Northern Sudan in these elections would actually catalyses recuperation processes among these culturally enslaved people because SPLM envisioned this war for cultural, economic and social identification. That ‘s why a renowned Southern Sudanese professor and an advisor to United Nations UN Secretary General on Genocide and Mass Atrocities, Dr. Francis M Deng titled one of his famous books as “War of Vision and Conflicts of Identities” referring to the protracted civil wars fought in the Sudan.
In this context, Dr. Francis Deng specifically summarized the Sudanese quest for freedom into a title of a book because it is all what SPLM was founded, with derivative core conception from the Pan Africanism as seen in Sudan African National Union SANU. SPLM and SANU were offspring and abstracted from the idea of Closed Districts Ordinance then during the colonial periods. But unlike the SANU, SPLM had vibrant and lively objectives with a lot of zeal and enthusiasm among the Africans from those areas referred to as closed Districts. Current SPLM deputy chairman, Malik Agar and Late Yusuf Kuwa Mekki are prominent examples of those who ushered way forward among the northern black Africans enslaved in northern parts of the Sudan.
In my descriptions, they are never exceptional, however their stance shaped the Movement into a recognized national liberation army wanted to liberate the whole country from Arabs hegemony. It is the African tribes that were subjected to neo colonialism in the country in spite of their massive contributions in realizing independence Sudan of 1.1.1956.
For this matter, SPLM is the only choice and preferred option among the Northern marginalised African nationalities if they are to live a free lives like the rest of their kin and kiths later in independence South Sudan as secession is eminent, comes year 2011 referendum for the people of Southern Sudan. For the case of Abyei, the axe is already grounded despite the fact that it is a bitter pill to swallow among our northern brothers.
As a person bordering Nuba Mountains, I know how costly it would be for the Nuba people to stand together advocating a uniform voice in ushering a new destiny in their popular consultation due to their existing ideological political differences apart from deep Islamic influence on the region. In such a case, SPLM remains the only preferred option if they like to be a Nuba well adjacent to South Sudan unlike their brothers the Nubia in the far North whose social settlement, political live and traditional settlement was straddled across international boundaries of Sudan and Egypt, the former political mentor of Sudanese Arab descendants in the Sudan.
In reference to the SPLM principle of liberating the marginalised, this concept would have been widely accepted amongst them because its referential sense made more impact in the north than in Southern Sudan the birth place of the party. SPLM is their rightful remedy because if South Sudan secedes without them being granted their inalienable rights, it would be very difficult if not impossible for them to forge a cultural pride and identity nor economic leverages due to their cultural docility and submissiveness to Arabs as signified by their easy acceptance to Islamic Cultures.
It is a known fact today that Arab tribes form the majority of the Sudanese whereas Islam remains the religion of the majority thus, the two qualities of an Islamic state are met on assumption that Darfur, Nuba Mountains, and Eastern Sudan are cultured Arabs especially when some of them don’t voice in their tribal tongues or languages and don’t profess their African faith. Southern Sudan has withstood this simple temptation of Arabisation and Islamisation by tough adherence to indigenous customs and believes.
If SPLM had succeeded in persuading NCP to add question of ethnicity and religion on the census form, professors of history in the Sudan would have been taken to court of law for having misled the country or their academic papers would have been confiscated if not revoked because new history is to be rewritten and Sudan becomes a nation historical misled by educated fellows.
To me, a graduate of history today in Sudan worth none the paper he/she holds because he underwent trainings through distorted syllabi. It also worth mentions that SPLM as the only vocal instrument that has shown up as a tough challenger to NCP and its extremism ideologies is optional because life would be normal if they take over in the north despite a separate South Sudan. Let marginalised survives SPLM in the North so that it advocates for their long denied and hidden rights. It is because we had learned enough from all other Sudanese political forces that have ruled Sudan since independence. If they had political will to grant rights of marginalised, they would have done it since there was neither visible nor invisible barricades preventing them from doing so voluntarily. So marginalised cannot rely on any political party in the North because enough is enoughed.
Therefore, the only possible avenue as the hope among the marginalised Sudanese is to vote for the SPLM whether be it at the presidency and in various legislative Assemblies in order to have decent human life otherwise, there would always be unfilled vacuum of political doubts as our country is characterized by political dishonesty especially the ruling class which we have known for sometimes. Voting for the SPLM would remain the beginning of second liberation for the oppressed Sudanese in northern Sudan.
Atok Dan is a journalist working with Southern Sudan Radio & TV and he is reachable at atokfuture@gmail.com
“In the democracy of the dead all men at last are equal. There is neither rank nor station nor prerogative in the republic of the grave”
Voting for SPLM in these elections would be a definite genesis of second liberation for Northern marginalised, Islamized and Arabised African Sudanese that were not directly or indirectly involved in the two decades war of liberation fought in Southern Sudan of which other exposed peripherals like Southern Blue, Nuba Mountains as well as eastern fronts participated. In fact, debates heated up the atmosphere between the SPLM and the National Congress Party NCP during the 2008 Sudan Fifth Household Census on the questions of Ethnicity and religion with consistent stance by the SPLM to overhaul the questionnaires of inclusivity of questions on ethnicity and creeds, besides demographic facts.
In every Census, there are predominant factors considered why census ought to be carried out in any nation especially in rare cases where civil population was partially involved in protracted wars and massive migrations whether be it internal or external displacement like the case of Sudan. It is always a global assumption that lives were lost and children were born in continuity of normal live but with intention of equating death to birth rate, besides emphasis on how conflicts affected normal traditional settlements of the people hereafter long unrest, census is always preferred to establish facts.
Sudan is never exceptional because civil population was displaced, lives were lost and traditional economic aspect of the people was in ruin leaving the rural population in total destitute, and in economic disarrays. Urban settlements were overhauled as the population moved to safer zones for periodical safeguards.
Today, major towns in northern Sudan outburst as the population shot up in the shortest time opposed to normal population growth given the fact that this very rural population urban and migration was forceful and given the deplorable conditions in which they are subject to, societies, communities and individuals end up bending some of their traditional norms and customs to forge a new way of survival in that new environment and hence, assimilations through marriages of conveniences resulted into half breed offspring whose identities remain loyal to economic muscular individuals.
The victims of such unintended ploy were Black African tribes in both the South and the North and whose social being were disrupted by social injustices as well as cross cultural settlement patterns. Their daughters went for light skinned or Afro Arab men for the sake of survival because these men were historically privileged on the expenses of oppressed Africans.
These were reasons why questions of ethnicity and religion were thrashed off as a matter of denying the true natural account of what this unfortunate country faceted. With a false preaching in Northern Sudan pronouncing this country as both Arab and Islamic state, these facts would have prevailed wrong in the previous census if the two components of ethnicity and religion were answered in the exercise. Now Sudan remains an Arab and Islamic state because of political dishonesty through genocidal procedures. Force displacement, trickery assimilation and economic tortures amount to genocide in one way or the other.
People loss their cultures, land and even direct torturing and killings which deprived them of their cultural prides, subjecting them into a state of cultural inferiority or even seeing themselves either a weak race or society, based on these silent intended strategies. But because these very people still have that cultural egos not completely deleted in them, the Arabs reinforce the strategy through a force like by inculcating into them rejection, self identification, giving them Islamic names and a forced believe. For the case of Sudan, Islamic names and believes were enforced in substitute of their African norms and believes.
In order to break these cycles, it is only possible through voting in SPLM in these elections so that a new political dispensation is created to provide equal opportunities to all the Sudanese people who are oppressed for so long. As a political force founded among the oppressed and none privileged Sudanese, it is ready to awaken our recess genes in recalling who we are exactly. It is called self recognition.
Having stayed in slavery for a period older than my thirty years on earth, these black Africans actually need a concept of total liberation to dominate their gone to recess genes so that they are able to stand tall in their persons and communities to revive and rejuvenate their cultures minus the conditionally acquired Arab cultures.
Voting SPLM to be the dominant party in Northern Sudan in these elections would actually catalyses recuperation processes among these culturally enslaved people because SPLM envisioned this war for cultural, economic and social identification. That ‘s why a renowned Southern Sudanese professor and an advisor to United Nations UN Secretary General on Genocide and Mass Atrocities, Dr. Francis M Deng titled one of his famous books as “War of Vision and Conflicts of Identities” referring to the protracted civil wars fought in the Sudan.
In this context, Dr. Francis Deng specifically summarized the Sudanese quest for freedom into a title of a book because it is all what SPLM was founded, with derivative core conception from the Pan Africanism as seen in Sudan African National Union SANU. SPLM and SANU were offspring and abstracted from the idea of Closed Districts Ordinance then during the colonial periods. But unlike the SANU, SPLM had vibrant and lively objectives with a lot of zeal and enthusiasm among the Africans from those areas referred to as closed Districts. Current SPLM deputy chairman, Malik Agar and Late Yusuf Kuwa Mekki are prominent examples of those who ushered way forward among the northern black Africans enslaved in northern parts of the Sudan.
In my descriptions, they are never exceptional, however their stance shaped the Movement into a recognized national liberation army wanted to liberate the whole country from Arabs hegemony. It is the African tribes that were subjected to neo colonialism in the country in spite of their massive contributions in realizing independence Sudan of 1.1.1956.
For this matter, SPLM is the only choice and preferred option among the Northern marginalised African nationalities if they are to live a free lives like the rest of their kin and kiths later in independence South Sudan as secession is eminent, comes year 2011 referendum for the people of Southern Sudan. For the case of Abyei, the axe is already grounded despite the fact that it is a bitter pill to swallow among our northern brothers.
As a person bordering Nuba Mountains, I know how costly it would be for the Nuba people to stand together advocating a uniform voice in ushering a new destiny in their popular consultation due to their existing ideological political differences apart from deep Islamic influence on the region. In such a case, SPLM remains the only preferred option if they like to be a Nuba well adjacent to South Sudan unlike their brothers the Nubia in the far North whose social settlement, political live and traditional settlement was straddled across international boundaries of Sudan and Egypt, the former political mentor of Sudanese Arab descendants in the Sudan.
In reference to the SPLM principle of liberating the marginalised, this concept would have been widely accepted amongst them because its referential sense made more impact in the north than in Southern Sudan the birth place of the party. SPLM is their rightful remedy because if South Sudan secedes without them being granted their inalienable rights, it would be very difficult if not impossible for them to forge a cultural pride and identity nor economic leverages due to their cultural docility and submissiveness to Arabs as signified by their easy acceptance to Islamic Cultures.
It is a known fact today that Arab tribes form the majority of the Sudanese whereas Islam remains the religion of the majority thus, the two qualities of an Islamic state are met on assumption that Darfur, Nuba Mountains, and Eastern Sudan are cultured Arabs especially when some of them don’t voice in their tribal tongues or languages and don’t profess their African faith. Southern Sudan has withstood this simple temptation of Arabisation and Islamisation by tough adherence to indigenous customs and believes.
If SPLM had succeeded in persuading NCP to add question of ethnicity and religion on the census form, professors of history in the Sudan would have been taken to court of law for having misled the country or their academic papers would have been confiscated if not revoked because new history is to be rewritten and Sudan becomes a nation historical misled by educated fellows.
To me, a graduate of history today in Sudan worth none the paper he/she holds because he underwent trainings through distorted syllabi. It also worth mentions that SPLM as the only vocal instrument that has shown up as a tough challenger to NCP and its extremism ideologies is optional because life would be normal if they take over in the north despite a separate South Sudan. Let marginalised survives SPLM in the North so that it advocates for their long denied and hidden rights. It is because we had learned enough from all other Sudanese political forces that have ruled Sudan since independence. If they had political will to grant rights of marginalised, they would have done it since there was neither visible nor invisible barricades preventing them from doing so voluntarily. So marginalised cannot rely on any political party in the North because enough is enoughed.
Therefore, the only possible avenue as the hope among the marginalised Sudanese is to vote for the SPLM whether be it at the presidency and in various legislative Assemblies in order to have decent human life otherwise, there would always be unfilled vacuum of political doubts as our country is characterized by political dishonesty especially the ruling class which we have known for sometimes. Voting for the SPLM would remain the beginning of second liberation for the oppressed Sudanese in northern Sudan.
Atok Dan is a journalist working with Southern Sudan Radio & TV and he is reachable at atokfuture@gmail.com
Let’s defend our political titles
By Atok Dan Baguoot.
In a nation where titles are shared, the only person robbed of the prestige is the president. Today in Southern Sudan, titles are shared regardless of the positions and ranks a person holds. In many countries only president, vice president, ambassadors and other few dignitaries deserve the title of “His Excellence” normally abbreviated as H.E. For our case, almost every dignitary carries that title but the funny thing here is that an outsider could wonder what specific title to use when addressing a boss in his/her office. Ministers share the same title of H.E. with the president, vice president, ambassadors as well as County Commissioners and head of independent Commissions. In Southern Sudan, president, his vice president and ambassadors are robbed of that title of H.E. It is a country of excellence performers.
The philosophical concept behind the use of such titles is associated with its acquisitions. You earn a title or acquire it through recognition from a respected institution. For instance, title honorable is derived from academic title honorary and his excellence also originated from nursery school concept of motivating young kids to concentrate in their studies. Whenever a child get some good marks, the tutor has to reward that child with that title in order to make him/her do much and also to motivate other kids who might have not gotten it to do the same. Some teachers do stick a yellowish shine decorated cartoon-like structure in an exercise book of that kid who has done well and if it is seen by others, they all strive hard to get that too.
Nevertheless, these titles are accorded in same manner. A president and his vice deserve that title because after being preferred as the only persons to head a nation out of many who competed for the post, only one person is opted by the whole majority therefore, he/she becomes H.E like a kids who has gotten the required marks proposed by the teacher. An Ambassador also qualifies for the title simply because he represents his nation in a foreign country alone out of the many that would have done too. In a country where leaders rise to high leadership position through other means apart from democratic elections, the title becomes imposed. South Sudan is not exceptional and whoever carries that title does so because of either historical background of liberation struggle or any other equivalent means.
President of the government of Southern Sudan and his vice also became suited with the title because of their struggle backgrounds. Life in the bush was unbearable and many didn’t dare to withstand the hardship hence, they deserve it too. But not all deserve it also because it becomes monotony and as a result it would either sound like mere mockery instead of decent and respectful address, besides it distinctive use.
The title Honorable is commonly used in the like situation derived from competition though it has definite distinction where it can also suits the bearer. Apart from it being an academic title, a member of parliament can also have it before his/her name to signify how he acquired the title MP. A Member of Parliament competes with rest in order to win the interest of the constituency to become their representative in the parliament. Without that subjectivity, you cannot be honoured with the title but unless there is a dictate signifying the use. Our current MPs have that condition qualifying them for the title. But the question next door is that as their constitutional term expires, will they retain it or fresh mandate is needed from them.
The term is so comfortable that one always wishes to have it up to the last day to the grave or world where there is no title, not even academic doctorate. With those religious, a saint is the title that people scramble although it is left in cemetery with white clothes a dead body is draped. That is the fact about the world of true equality.
Let’s go for free and fair elections so that we continue using our distinguished titles without complains, otherwise, they won’t make meaning. Our president spoke nicely in the Monday’s peaceful demonstration telling the public that registration exercise was peaceful and this signifies peaceful elections. This message went to those who had in the back of their minds to retain their titles in dishonest manner.
The only person who knows how tough to run a government where almost everybody is appointed is the President. He said he is tired of answering phone calls instructing him to remove any of his legislators and governors every now and then. H.E. President Mayardit said he will be relieved from answering phone asking him to remove a leader if all leaders are elected by their own people. Not even a fool will dare calling Mr. President to remove anybody if all are democratically elected. It would also be a chance for those fearing the weighs of their titles to lift them lighter. Honorable will be truer and unconditionally imposed.
As the constitutional term of our MPs expires, it would be very difficult for the President to form another parliament without elections because deriving to criteria of selecting the next incumbents of the August House would prove tough. For instance, if H.E. the President goes for Mr. Atok Dan to be next honorable for Parieng County in juba parliament, in his mind will be the criterion of getting me out of that one hundred thousand population of Panaruu Dinka. This personal question will also transcend in the minds of local persons deep in the village asking the president the same question how he got that person whom we hate most again.
By the way I like the prefix honorable but the question lingering in my mind is that, do
I have what it takes to be so before I reach them the “barometers” who will gauge my performances? This is the question that keeps away most of our current MPs from their constituencies. Those rating zero in their constituencies will never even think of uttering even a mere negative political rhetoric before their populace and thus, they either prefer unilateral declaration of the independent of the South to a peaceful referendum or a magical short cut to referendum without elections so that by God’s luck they continue enjoying their tenant without disturbances yet not knowing that the whole South wants elections because of them.
A president can run a nation with his cabinet plus the effort from security forces but for the sake of accountability and proximity of power to people, an answerable parliament ought to be so that power is closer to people in a devolved manner so that it links the people with the further centre. Lastly, let’s quench our bloody thirst by instituting an answerable system which our kids and generations would be proud of before historians could settle with their facts as history does not forgive. Be careful of reckless utterances otherwise our intuition tones dance in compliance with whatever we speak.
Atok Dan is a journalist working with Southern Sudan Radio & TV and he is reached at atokfuture@gmail.com
In a nation where titles are shared, the only person robbed of the prestige is the president. Today in Southern Sudan, titles are shared regardless of the positions and ranks a person holds. In many countries only president, vice president, ambassadors and other few dignitaries deserve the title of “His Excellence” normally abbreviated as H.E. For our case, almost every dignitary carries that title but the funny thing here is that an outsider could wonder what specific title to use when addressing a boss in his/her office. Ministers share the same title of H.E. with the president, vice president, ambassadors as well as County Commissioners and head of independent Commissions. In Southern Sudan, president, his vice president and ambassadors are robbed of that title of H.E. It is a country of excellence performers.
The philosophical concept behind the use of such titles is associated with its acquisitions. You earn a title or acquire it through recognition from a respected institution. For instance, title honorable is derived from academic title honorary and his excellence also originated from nursery school concept of motivating young kids to concentrate in their studies. Whenever a child get some good marks, the tutor has to reward that child with that title in order to make him/her do much and also to motivate other kids who might have not gotten it to do the same. Some teachers do stick a yellowish shine decorated cartoon-like structure in an exercise book of that kid who has done well and if it is seen by others, they all strive hard to get that too.
Nevertheless, these titles are accorded in same manner. A president and his vice deserve that title because after being preferred as the only persons to head a nation out of many who competed for the post, only one person is opted by the whole majority therefore, he/she becomes H.E like a kids who has gotten the required marks proposed by the teacher. An Ambassador also qualifies for the title simply because he represents his nation in a foreign country alone out of the many that would have done too. In a country where leaders rise to high leadership position through other means apart from democratic elections, the title becomes imposed. South Sudan is not exceptional and whoever carries that title does so because of either historical background of liberation struggle or any other equivalent means.
President of the government of Southern Sudan and his vice also became suited with the title because of their struggle backgrounds. Life in the bush was unbearable and many didn’t dare to withstand the hardship hence, they deserve it too. But not all deserve it also because it becomes monotony and as a result it would either sound like mere mockery instead of decent and respectful address, besides it distinctive use.
The title Honorable is commonly used in the like situation derived from competition though it has definite distinction where it can also suits the bearer. Apart from it being an academic title, a member of parliament can also have it before his/her name to signify how he acquired the title MP. A Member of Parliament competes with rest in order to win the interest of the constituency to become their representative in the parliament. Without that subjectivity, you cannot be honoured with the title but unless there is a dictate signifying the use. Our current MPs have that condition qualifying them for the title. But the question next door is that as their constitutional term expires, will they retain it or fresh mandate is needed from them.
The term is so comfortable that one always wishes to have it up to the last day to the grave or world where there is no title, not even academic doctorate. With those religious, a saint is the title that people scramble although it is left in cemetery with white clothes a dead body is draped. That is the fact about the world of true equality.
Let’s go for free and fair elections so that we continue using our distinguished titles without complains, otherwise, they won’t make meaning. Our president spoke nicely in the Monday’s peaceful demonstration telling the public that registration exercise was peaceful and this signifies peaceful elections. This message went to those who had in the back of their minds to retain their titles in dishonest manner.
The only person who knows how tough to run a government where almost everybody is appointed is the President. He said he is tired of answering phone calls instructing him to remove any of his legislators and governors every now and then. H.E. President Mayardit said he will be relieved from answering phone asking him to remove a leader if all leaders are elected by their own people. Not even a fool will dare calling Mr. President to remove anybody if all are democratically elected. It would also be a chance for those fearing the weighs of their titles to lift them lighter. Honorable will be truer and unconditionally imposed.
As the constitutional term of our MPs expires, it would be very difficult for the President to form another parliament without elections because deriving to criteria of selecting the next incumbents of the August House would prove tough. For instance, if H.E. the President goes for Mr. Atok Dan to be next honorable for Parieng County in juba parliament, in his mind will be the criterion of getting me out of that one hundred thousand population of Panaruu Dinka. This personal question will also transcend in the minds of local persons deep in the village asking the president the same question how he got that person whom we hate most again.
By the way I like the prefix honorable but the question lingering in my mind is that, do
I have what it takes to be so before I reach them the “barometers” who will gauge my performances? This is the question that keeps away most of our current MPs from their constituencies. Those rating zero in their constituencies will never even think of uttering even a mere negative political rhetoric before their populace and thus, they either prefer unilateral declaration of the independent of the South to a peaceful referendum or a magical short cut to referendum without elections so that by God’s luck they continue enjoying their tenant without disturbances yet not knowing that the whole South wants elections because of them.
A president can run a nation with his cabinet plus the effort from security forces but for the sake of accountability and proximity of power to people, an answerable parliament ought to be so that power is closer to people in a devolved manner so that it links the people with the further centre. Lastly, let’s quench our bloody thirst by instituting an answerable system which our kids and generations would be proud of before historians could settle with their facts as history does not forgive. Be careful of reckless utterances otherwise our intuition tones dance in compliance with whatever we speak.
Atok Dan is a journalist working with Southern Sudan Radio & TV and he is reached at atokfuture@gmail.com
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