Kiir Says Politicians Ignited South Sudan Inter-tribal Clashes

By Isaac Vuni

April 12, 2009 (JUBA) – The President of the Government of Southern Sudan, Salva Kiir Mayardit, said there is serious tribal conflict among southerners today being perpetrated by some politicians who are obstructing peaceful living, despite having avoided tribal fighting during the civil war that lasted for 22 years.

Salva Kiir (left) with a church leader at Kator Cathedral in Juba, some days before Easter. "There was no tribal conflict when we were fighting in the bush," said Kiir during an Easter feast at St. Theresa Cathedral Kator.

Without mentioning names, the president emphasized that some politicians for their own benefit are out to instigate innocent southerners to fight each other, adding that there had been serious tribal fighting in Upper Nile, Jonglei, Eastern Equatoria, Warrap and Lakes states.

Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army, the insurgency that brought Kiir to power, presents itself as a pan-tribal movement that represents all “marginalized” peoples of the Sudan, and it makes “tribalism” a key target of party invective.

After the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), many southern communities rose against each other. Thousands of people have been killed in South Sudan villages yearly despite this accord reached in Kenya on January 9, 2005.

Inter-tribal or community-level violence has been touched off by cattle raiding and resource competition, the uneven advance of civilian disarmament campaigns, competition over stakes in the different layers of the newly established government, and land and grazing rights — matters complicated by massive refugee returns.

President Kiir’s remarks today follow a recent meeting of southern opposition leaders in Kenana of White Nile State in northern Sudan, who slammed the South’s ruling party for “the continuously deteriorating administrative, security and political situation in Southern Sudan.”

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