After two years of exile in South Africa, Riek Machar has returned to South Sudan. That was made possible through the latest effort to restore peace to the troubled country.
Machar returned to take up the role of vice president, a role from which President Salva Kiir fired him in 2013, consequently plunging Africa’s youngest nation into the chaos it has barely been able to contain.
Central to South Sudan’s problem, as has been the case in many other African countries, is the question of ethnicity and leaders who exploit the diversity of African ethnicity and cultures to push selfish interests.
While they should have worked together to give South Sudan the impetus required to catapult it to greater heights of development, the Dinka and Neur tribes of South Sudan have been manipulated to view each other with utmost mistrust and hatred.
The useless war in South Sudan has confined the oil rich country to penury, disrupting the country’s socio-economic activities while also displacing more than 2.5 million people internally. The death toll in the war is over 10,000, which raises the question; for what cause did they have to die?
Over the years, there have been numerous efforts spearheaded by neighbouring countries Kenya and Ethiopia, the African Union and Inter Governmental Authority on Development to no avail. The last attempt at securing a peace in South Sudan’s fighting fell through in 2016, thrusting the country deeper into chaos and anarchy.
To a larger extent, this has been because of lack of political goodwill essential to any peace agreement. South Sudan must exist in a peaceful environment to also accord its neighbours peace for indeed; a chaotic South Sudan is not good for the region.
The decades long suffering in Somalia after clan wars threw the country into total anarchy should serve to warn other countries of the dangers of infighting when greater benefits would accrue from standing together
The release of Machar’s allies as part of the peace deal shows good intent on President Kiir’s part. It is now up to Vice President Machar to reciprocate the goodwill gesture, bury their differences and work for the good of the people of South Sudan who had immense trust in them following the referendum that hived South Sudan off Sudan in the North. This time round, the peace deal should hold.
