Africa

September 16, 2016 (JUBA) – Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning in South Sudan has introduced new measures which restrict medical referrals abroad due to the ongoing economic crisis in the young country.

South Sudan minister Stephen Dhieu Dau (Getty photo)

Minister of Finance, Stephen Dhieu Dau, in an order issued on Wednesday, said there is no budget allocated for medical referrals this year. He said any claims of payment for the referrals has therefore been cancelled.

“All requests for payments and claims from all public institutions, meant for treatment of public officials outside the country are hereby cancelled by this order until the approval of 2016/2017 Financial Year Budget,” Minister Dau wrote in the statement dated 14 September.

“Any public institution or agency that intends to budget for medical referrals must also be done in controlled and verifiably admissible cases,” he further directed in the order seen by Sudan Tribune.

The country has been spending hundreds of thousands of US dollars every year to refer abroad some of its officials for medical treatments. The new order instead suggested the need to improve on the existing hospitals in the country which can be used for the referrals instead of to abroad.

Dau said the ministry together with the ministry of health were working on mechanisms for future referrals.

It remains unclear how the country, hit by economic crisis, plans to secure funds for upgrading of the existing poorly equipped hospitals.

(ST)

September 16, 2016 (KHARTOUM) - The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) on Friday said the number of South Sudanese refugees living in neighbouring countries “has this week passed the one million mark”.

South Sudanese refugees perform a traditional dance as President Omer Hassan al-Bashir addresses a crowd a rally held in Ed Daein, East Darfur, April 5, 2016. April 5, 2016. (Photo Reuters/Mohamed Nureldin Abdallah)

UNHCR spokesperson Leo Dobbs told reporters in Geneva on Friday that South Sudan, with this milestone, joins Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia as countries which have produced more than a million refugees.

“Most of those fleeing South Sudan are women and children. They include survivors of violent attacks, sexual assault, children that have been separated from their parents or travelled alone, the disabled, the elderly and people in need of urgent medical care,” he said.

According to the UNCHR, more than 185,000 people have fled South Sudan since fresh violence erupted in the country in Juba on July 8.

Dobbs noted that “more than three quarters of the recent arrivals have crossed into Uganda, but a growing number of people have entered Ethiopia's western Gambella region in the past week and others have been heading to Kenya, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Central African Republic (CAR)”.

According to the UNHCR, “Uganda is hosting the lion's share of South Sudanese refugees, with 373,626, more than a third of them arriving since early July. They keep coming; over the past week more than 20,000 new arrivals were recorded, primarily through the Oraba crossing in the northwest”.

SUDAN SAYS RECEIVED HALF OF SOUTH SUDAN'S REFUGEES

Meanwhile, Sudan's refugee commission has put the number of South Sudanese refugees who arrived in Sudan at 500,000, saying most of them are living in the White Nile, East Darfur, West and South Kordofan states.

The Sudanese Red Crescent Society (SRCS) on Friday said that 82,000 South Sudanese refugees have arrived in the gathering points in the localities of Al-Gabalain and Al-Salam since 2014.

SRCS executive director Osama Osman Talha pointed that 40 to 50 South Sudanese families arrive in Sudan daily through three crossing points in the White Nile state including Al-Migaines, Al-Kowaik and Joddah.

He added the refugees are received at eight gathering points, stressing the health conditions in these points are stable.

Talha further said that government organs, UN agencies and civil society groups provide all food and health services for the refugees.

In December 2013, Sudan's President Omer al-Bashir decided to treat South Sudanese refugees as citizens and refused establishing refugee camps for them, saying they can live and work all over Sudan.

However, earlier this month, Sudan decided to treat South Sudanese that fled the conflict in their country as refugees, enabling United Nations to provide assistance and raise funds for aid operations.

(ST)

September 16, 2016 (JUBA) – The top leadership of the armed opposition faction of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM-IO) under the leadership of the former First Vice President, Riek Machar, will meet in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, in the next few days, opposition officials have confirmed.

South Sudan's former FVP Riek Machar, speaking to visitors at his residence in Khartoum, on 1 September 2016 (courtesy photo of SPLM-IO)

“Yes, our leadership will meet in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum. It will take place in the next few days,” confirmed James Gatdet Dak, opposition leader's spokesperson.

The gathering will be the first since 8 July when fighting erupted in the South Sudan's capital, Juba, between forces loyal to President Salva Kiir and bodyguards of Machar.

Dak said the meeting will review the situation following the violence “which was ordered by Salva Kiir in an attempt to kill Dr. Riek Machar.”

The renewed war has threatened the collapse of the peace deal signed in August 2015 to end 21 months of the civil war that started in December 2013.

The opposition leader's spokesman said members of the political bureau and the national liberation council of the SPLM-IO have travelled from Juba, Kampala, Nairobi and Addis Ababa to take part in the Khartoum's consultative meeting.

He said the meeting may begin on Sunday or Monday.

Machar was transferred to Khartoum from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) after he was extracted by the United Nations at the South Sudan-DRC border.

He fled Juba during the July fighting and walked for 40 days to the neighbouring nation.

He was hospitalized in both DRC and Khartoum on "humanitarian grounds" due to swollen legs and extreme exhaustion.

His health has however stabilized and has been released from hospital weeks ago.

(ST)

By Eric Reeves

In both the 2004 and 2008 presidential campaigns, the Darfur region of western Sudan was an unlikely but entirely appropriate topic. After all, the U.S. Congress had—in a remarkable bipartisan, bicameral vote in July 2004—declared that what was occurring in Darfur at the hands of the Khartoum regime was “genocide.” So too did President George W. Bush, as did then-Secretary of State Colin Powell in a speech to the UN, citing a detailed and rigorous assessment by a nongovernmental human rights groups. The 2004 campaign of then-Senator John Kerry asked me to vet closely their own statement on Darfur.

In 2008 candidate Obama's campaign made much of Darfur and the continuing rape, slaughter, and displacement of civilians belonging to Darfur's African (non-Arab) tribal groups, a brutal counter-insurgency campaign conducted by Khartoum's regular and militia forces. At one moment in his campaign, Obama declared that Darfur was a “stain on our souls,” and vowed that as president, he did not “intend to abandon people or turn a blind eye to slaughter.” Candidate Hillary Clinton in 2008 also made strong statements about genocide in Darfur, and the issue actually emerged in one question posed in the final presidential debates of that year between John McCain and Obama.

In the campaign of 2016 there has been no mention of Darfur, hardly surprising for Donald Trump, given his vast deficit in knowledge of foreign policy issues. But there is nothing on the Clinton website, no public statement, no indication that she understands the current realities in Darfur are every bit as bad as when she was making her own unctuous declarations in 2008.

There are two reasons for this. The Darfur civil society movement in this country—as remarkable as any since the time of apartheid-era South Africa—had largely disappeared by the 2008 – 2009. The reasons for this are many, but central was the decision by the Obama administration to “de-couple” Darfur from the key bilateral issues between Washington and Khartoum, namely (1) the U.S. intelligence community's desire for counter-terrorism from a regime that remains one of three countries on the State Department's annual list of “State Sponsors of Terrorism”; (2) Khartoum's desperate desire to be removed from that list and to see the lifting of comprehensive economic sanctions first imposed during the presidency of Bill Clinton.

“De-couple” is not my word choice: it is that of a “senior administration official” referred to as such in a background interview given in November 2010 (for which there is an official State Department transcript). And though articulated explicitly only two years after Obama's election, it reflected policy priorities articulated by then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and President Obama's first, disastrous choice for the role of Special Envoy for Sudan, Air Force Major-General (ret.) Scott Gration.

Gration had no diplomatic experience, no significant knowledge of Sudan or its history, or any relevant language other than English. His policy views were animated by the absurdly naïve belief, as reported by the Washington Post, that a regime of hardened génocidaires could be appealed to with “cookies”: “We've got to think about giving out cookies… Kids, countries—they react to gold stars, smiley faces, handshakes, agreements, talk, engagement."

Obama's Sudan policies have ensured that there is little interest in Darfur within his administration that is not guided by the lust for counter-terrorism intelligence. And yet the carnage continues, indeed has escalated significantly over the past four years, culminating this year in a savage assault on the civilians in the last rebel redoubt in the Jebel Marra mountains of central Darfur.

Reports from the past thirteen years of ethnically-targeted conflict strongly suggest that in excess of 500,000 people have been killed, directly or indirectly, by violence; more than 3 million Darfuris have been displaced from their homes—some 300,000 as refugees in the harsh environs of neighboring eastern Chad; tens of thousands of girls and women have been raped, often gang-raped, while those assaulting them hurl hateful racial epithets.

The violent expropriation of farmland that has also accelerated, ensuring that peace will be much more difficult to achieve than when Obama assumed office, despite his soaring campaign rhetoric of 2008. We hear nothing of this. Hillary Clinton is unlikely to speak about Sudan since she was Secretary of State when Darfur began to tip into greater violence. Donald Trump probably couldn't locate Darfur on a map, and all indications are that he would take no interest in Darfur [see “Political Postscript” below]. And debate moderators have either themselves forgotten Darfur or can't imagine it of interest to television viewers. Syria will serve as a surrogate for all “troubled regions.”

The brutal men in Khartoum will watch all this with the keenest interest as they contemplate their next offensive in Darfur, which—coincidentally—will begin in November, when the seasonal rains have ended. They will conclude that genocide is simply no longer a political issue of interest for the American people.

Political Postscript:

In almost eighteen years of committed research and advocacy for a just peace in greater Sudan, I have tried assiduously not to allow my work to be determined or influenced by American political issues unrelated to Sudan. The same is true for issues elsewhere in Africa and the Middle East, if unrelated to Sudan—this despite many requests for broadcast interviews. My view has been simple: I should speak about what I have come to know well over these years, and that partisanship cannot help advance the cause of Sudan in the United States, where Sudan has traditionally bi-partisan issue. I have at times been sharply critical of the Clinton administration, the George W. Bush administration, and most fiercely of the Obama administration.

But the candidacy of Donald Trump does not permit me to stay silent, given my primary concern at present for the people of Darfur—people who are universally Muslim; who are all “African” in the broadest sense, and “dark-skinned”; and who offer nothing of interest to a a Trump administration, should it be our great misfortune to see this “national disgrace” (to borrow the word's of Colin Powell, Secretary of State during a Republican administration) become president.

Trump's racism, his xenophobia—extending to a virulently anti-Muslim campaign rhetoric—and his stunning ignorance of world affairs (declaring, for example, in an ABC Television news interview that he would prevent Russian troop from entering Ukraine, despite the fact they are have been present since 2014)…all suggest that Darfur and Sudan as a whole would suffer greatly from policies guided by ignorance and hatred. Caring for the innocent civilians of Darfur and other marginalized regions of Sudan is a compelling reason not to vote for Donald Trump.

Eric Reeves has written extensively on Sudan for almost two decades; he is a Senior Fellow at Harvard University's François-Xavier Bagnoud Center for Health and Human Rights

Concluding its first visit to South Sudan, a United Nations-mandated human rights mission today expressed deep concern over rights violations and the slow implementation of the August 2015 peace agreement between rival political factions.

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September 15, 2016 (TORIT) - The assembly in Namorunyang, one of South Sudan's new states has re-opened for its second session after a three-month recess.

Namorunyang state governor Louis Lobong Lojore (ST)

Majority of lawmakers who spoke at the occasion agitated for institutional reforms.

The assembly speaker, Peter Bosco specifically urged lawmakers to cooperate with line ministries so that a policy statement can drafted as soon as possible.

Government institutions works when there is policy guideline to help them run their activities smoothly with progress in the states institutions, Bosco told the lawmakers.

He specifically appealed to lawmakers to pass resolution allowing the executive to perform.

“There can be no activities done by the executive without resolution passed in the parliament,” he stressed.

Meanwhile the state governor, Louis Lobong Lojore appealed to the country's lawmakers to work hard towards the development of new state by promoting peace and reconciliation.

“Now that we have been given a state of our own, I wholeheartedly want to inform the people of Namorunyang state that you have been given it with its responsibility”, said the governor.

He appreciated the work of humanitarian agencies for supporting vulnerable people with basic needs especially at a time when the young nation was faces a political and economic crisis.

(ST)

By Tesfa-Alem Tekle

September 15, 2016 (ADDIS ABABA) – The Eritrean government has dismissed recent reports alleging that Saudi Arabia has transferred some 5,000 Yemeni militants to Eritrea for training in the Red Sea country.

A Houthi Shiite rebel carries his weapon as he joins others to protest against Saudi-led airstrikes at a rally in Sanaa, Yemen on 1 April 2015 (Photo: AP/Hani Mohamed)

The report released by the Fars news agency (FNA), an Iranian news agency, says that Riyadh is transferring the militants from Aden to Eritrea's Assab port to go under military trainings and then be sent to the Saudi provinces bordering Yemen.

“The terrorists, some of whom are from the Al-Qaeda, will be dispatched to Najran, Jizzan and Asir provinces to fight against the Yemeni army and popular forces and prevent their further advances in Southern Saudi Arabia,” the FNA said.

In reaction, the Eritrean government said the report is “a preposterous lie”.

“The allegation by Farsi News Agency represents a preposterous lie peddled for some ulterior motives,” said a statement issued by Asmara.

“Those who are familiar with the dynamics of the Horn of Africa/Middle East region know full well that Eritrea has been at the forefront – if not a pioneer – in the fight against Al-Qaeda and all the variants and off-shoots of this terrorist scourge,” the statement added.

The Eritrea government said as early as 1996, when imminent threat of Al-Qaeda was posed, Eritrea was locked in the fight against emerging plots and designs of the Ben-Laden group which was operating from the region at that point in time.

“Eritrea's unremitting and long-standing stance against terrorism is thus a matter of historical record,” it said..

The Saudi-led war against the Iranian- backed Shi'ite Houthi fighters in Yemen begun in 2015, after the internationally recognized President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi asked Arab countries for military assistance.

The request was made after an offensive by the Houthis who joined the former President Ali Saleh - ousted by Arab Spring protests in 2011 - and attacked the Hadi government at its provisional capital of Aden in March 2015.

(ST)

September 13, 2016 (JUBA) – The number of South Sudan's armed opposition fighters so far extracted from neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has reached over 750, according to the United Nations spokesperson, Stephane Dujarric.

“In addition to information we shared with you on Friday, the UN Peacekeeping Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUSCO), has continued to extract this group of individuals from the Garamba National Park in the DRC. Yesterday the Peacekeeping Mission extracted an additional 118 persons on humanitarian grounds,” Dujarric said in a statement.

“To date 752 individuals affiliated with the SPLM/A-IO have been extracted,” he added.

Among those extracted, he explained, 631 are in UN-run facilities in three locations inside the DRC, with some receiving medical treatment while others recovering from exhaustion.

“Security arrangements are in place in all locations,” Dujarric said.

He said the UN has continued to engage with both the DRC and the South Sudan authorities as well as regional actors to encourage them to find a solution to the presence of South Sudanese armed individuals in the territory of the DRC.

“Authorities of both countries are regularly informed of actions taken on the ground,” said Dujarric.

"All of those extracted were disarmed before boarding UN helicopters and the UN mission has those weapons secured," he further stressed.

The UN, however, reiterated that its operations were conducted on humanitarian grounds and within the role of contributing to stability in the DRC. It said authorities in South Sudan and of the DRC were all notified the UN's actions on the ground.

"The UN continues to engage with both DRC and South Sudan authorities to find a solution to the presence of South Sudan fighters within the territory of the DRC," said the UN official.

Meanwhile, the armed opposition faction (SPLM-IO) has confirmed that dozens of their officers who were extracted together with its leader Riek Machar in the DRC have already arrived in Pagak, the General Headquarters, at the Ethiopian border.

“Yes, some of our officers who were accompanying our leader from Juba to the DR Congo have already arrived in Pagak,” Machar's spokesperson, James Gatdet Dak, told Sudan Tribune Tuesday.

He said officers who arrived in Pagak last week included military spokesman, Colonel William Gatjiath Deng, extracted together with Machar at DRC border on 17 August.

(ST)

September 15, 2016 (JUBA) -The Association for Media Development in South Sudan (ADMISS) has issued a strong worded statement on Thursday in protest of the closure of an independent newspaper by government security personnel, describing it as a deliberate ploy to muzzle press freedom and access to public information.

A vendor sells newspapers in the South Sudanese capital, Juba (Photo: Al-Jazeera)

Alfred Taban, chairperson for the media association in the country said the organization views the closure of these media institutions as suppression of the press and clampdown on free speech.

He said the manner and nature through which these media institutions were closed speak to the fact that the government actions is geared toward silencing critical voices and information provided to our people.

"The Association for Media development in South Sudan strongly condemns the indefinite closure of the nation Mirror English daily newspaper by South Sudan national security", the statement bearing Alfred's signature, copy of which was extended to Sudan Tribune, reads in part.

The 15 September statement described the closure of the independent newspaper as a serious threat to freedom of expression and of the press. the unilateral decision, it further added, represents a clear sign of intimidation to scare media fraternity in the country from doing its work.

" AMDISS is deeply aggrieved with this unacceptable behaviour and calls on the concerned authorities to put to an end this act of interference and create a conducive environment for the media to play its role as the watchdog," the statement protested.

Meanwhile the Coalition of Civil Society organizations in South Sudan issued a statement in which they also protested the closure, saying such acts undermines freedom of the press.

According to the group, it is mind-boggling and breathtaking for the government led by officials who fought in a more than two decade conflict on promise of protecting democratic tenets to continue what it is terming as broad day closure of media institutions, thereby undermining the democracy with its attending tenets.

"We wish to categorically state that such acts undermine the objective of liberation struggle which culminated to the independence of this country. The behaviours themselves are confirming that allegations that the government does not tolerate an alternative view, which is unacceptable. We therefore call on the authorities to cease taking such decision in the interest of peace, love, harmony and tolerance," the group said in the statement.

The advocacy group and media association were reacting to a 14 September decision by the national security who asked the management of the Nation Mirror to stop publication with immediate effect after being summoned to headquarters of the national security service in Jebel area.

No reason was given for shutting down the paper. South Sudanese authorities have in the past shut down a number of newspapers, including The Citizen.

Many journalists have been killed in South Sudan for the past five years of its independence.

(ST)

September 15, 2016 (KHARTOUM) - The Sudan Call forces are preparing to meet in the Ethiopian capital to coordinate positions ahead of meetings with the government over cessation of hostilities and humanitarian access followed by a national constitutional dialogue conference.

Leaders of the opposition "Sudan Call" sign an agreement on the alliance's structures in Paris on 22 April 2016 (ST Photo)

Opposition sources told Sudan Tribune that the leadership Council of the opposition alliance will meet from 25 to 30 September to coordinate positions and discuss some organizational issues.

Also, the meeting will agree on the delegation of Sudan Call for the Strategic Meeting with the government over other confidence building measures before the constitutional conference and adopt unified positions for this meeting.

The mediation didn't yet announce the date of the meetings between the government and the armed groups. But I become obvious that it would be held in October.

Last August, three armed groups and the National Umma Party signed the Roadmap Agreement paving the way for talks on the humanitarian truce. However the parties failed to strike a deal over these issues.

After what the mediation decided to suspend the negotiations.

Last week the Sudanese government said the chief mediator Thabo Mbeki would visit Khartoum to discuss the resumption of talks. Also the government spokesperson Ahmed al-Balal expected that the meeting the rebel groups over the cessation of hostilities would resume after Eid al-Dha Festival. which ends on 15 September.

Will participate in this meeting, the two factions of the Sudanese Revolutionary Front, NUP, and civil society groups. For the National Consensus Forces will only take part in the meeting : the Sudanese Congress Party, the National Alliance, the Sudanese Ba'ath, the Sudanese National Party and the Center Alliance Party.

The Sudanese Communist Party and other groups said opposed to the process because it would not lead to regime change in Khartoum.

(ST)

September 14, 2016 (JUBA) – South Sudanese president, Salva Kiir, should resign from the presidency after the exposure of his involvement in the documented corruption practices, says spokesperson for the armed opposition leader, Riek Machar.

President adresses a joint press conference on 9 July 2016 (Reuters Photo)

A 65-page report by US-based ‘The Sentry' organization has revealed for the first time evidences of documented gross corruption practices involving President Kiir and his immediate family members, including his adolescent kids who also hold company shares worth millions of dollars.

Among Kiir's children involved in their father's revealed “groundbreaking” corruption in the report includes his 12-year-old son who held a 25% stake in a holding company formed in February this year.

Overall, the report has revealed evidences showing that at least 7 of Kiir's children – sons and daughters – with their names as well as companies' shares recorded in the report, and also with Kiir's wife, Mary Ayen Mayardit, have held stakes in various national and international business ventures through dubious deals at the expense of the suffering people.

Machar's spokesperson, James Gatdet Dak, said the report has painted a “shameful” picture for the president who should resign for the sake of his dignity and leave others to change the nation.

“If Salva Kiir is part of the world where shame is a heavy burden to carry and quitting voluntarily from public office is a wise decision to attempt to regain one's dignity in the face of that shame, I think he should resign immediately following the shameful exposure of his immeasurable corruption, together with his family,” Dak told Sudan Tribune.

“This corruption revelation has shown one thing very clear, that these leaders in Juba and their family members are a bunch of people who do not have vision for the country and the lives of their people,” he added.

The Sentry has found evidence that the top officials responsible for mass atrocities in South Sudan have managed to accumulate fortunes and have been involved in illegal transactions, insider deals and outright fraud.

Dak said his boss, Machar, was not implicated in the report, arguing that the only properties claimed to belong to him are rented and temporary guest houses in Nairobi and Addis Ababa, which are not owned houses.

He also challenged the government for threatening to sue in court The Sentry organization, saying the report implicated President Kiir and his family members by their names and not the government.

It is therefore Kiir as an individual that should sue the organization in court and not the South Sudanese government, he said.

KIIR LOST OPPORTUNITY

Dak further said the South Sudanese president, Kiir, has lost his opportunity to go down the history as a leader whose leadership gave birth to the independence of South Sudan and would have united the people and laid the foundation for development for the future generations.

He said the president will instead go down the “anal of history” as the most corrupt and violent divisive political leader in the history of South Sudan, who had no idea how the nation was born, torn it apart and squandered its wealth in the most “primitive way.”

Dak argued that most dictators in Africa at least provide services to their people, open up roads, build schools, hospitals, and ensure that their people can feed themselves, unlike Kiir who he claimed could not even connect with tarmacked road the national capital, Juba, with his home town of Kwajok, let alone the rest of the country.

The opposition leader claimed that his boss, Machar, provided numerous chances to president Kiir to become a good leader, but wasted such opportunities.

He claimed that when Machar championed the right to self-determination for the people of South Sudan since 1991 which finally brought the independence of South Sudan in July 2011, it was Kiir who was “made” to sign the “first protocol” on self-determination for the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) in July 2002. He said this was six months after the Nairobi declaration between Machar and late John Garang, who signed to the self-determination objective for the first time.

“You know the first time for Salva Kiir to actively surface politically was when he was made to sign the Machakos Protocol on self-determination for the CPA in July 2002 in Kenya. It was good that he held to it. But it is unfortunate that he did not know what to do for the people of South Sudan once that self-determination translated into independence,” he said.

When Kiir rebelled against Garang in Yei in November 2004, he added, it was Machar who took him to Rumbek and reconciled him with late Garang, which resulted to him being appointed as vice president in 2005.

Dak further said that when Garang died “mysteriously” in a Ugandan helicopter, Machar also recommended Kiir to replace the late leader, saying although he was not sure how to lead the people, Machar assured him that he was going to support him in the implementation of the agreement.

“But see what has happened now. He has been instead trying to kill Machar who was grooming him with the hope that he would become a good leader for the people and the country,” he said.

“Worst of all, he has turned the country into a madman's house with dying and suffering people,” Dak lamented.

President Kiir's spokesperson, Ateny Wek Ateny, on his part reacted angrily against the exposure of the president's corruption allegations, saying the government would take The Sentry to court.

However, a top official of The Sentry organization said they have “irrefutable” evidences that the president and his family have involved in the corruption, saying the information and documents were gathered from various partners involved.

“The evidence is thorough, it is detailed and it is irrefutable. It involves arms dealers, international lawyers, international banks, international real estate and it is because of these international actors that we are also able to provide solutions to help end this criminal behaviour to protect innocent civilians,” said Georg Clooney, co-founder of The Sentry, Enough Project.

(ST)

September 15, 2016 (JUBA) - South Sudan's Jonglei Governor Philip Aguer Panyang has appointed 14 counties in the new state which has been established last year.

Jonglei state governor, Phillip Aguer speaks during the independence occassion July 9, 2016 (ST)

New Jonglei is one of four states created from former Jonglei state established by President Salva Kiir in October 2015 when he signed a presidential decree dividing the country into 28 states.

Also a presidential decision subdivided the new state into 14 counties even if Governor Aguer initially proposed 11 counties.

Aguer rejected the additional counties, calling them "mistaken." He however backtracked when his request to delete the extra administrative units was rejected by local communities.

This Thursday, Aguer nominated the following commissioners for the 14 countries :

1. Deng Mabior Deng (Bor South County, Chueiker)
2. William Majier Alier (Bor Gok County, Kolnyang)
3. Mading Akol Biar (Bor East County, Anyidi)
4. Nhial Awan Deng (Anyidi Makuach County, Makuach)
5. Deng Garang Deng (Bor Central County, Makuach/Werkok)
6. Simon Thon Ayuen (Bor West County, Baidit)
7. Kuot Jok Lual (Athooc County, Kactong)
8. Luis Garang Apiu (Bor North County, Jalle)
9. Deng Mabany Kuot (Twic North County, Panyagor)
10. Dau Akoi Jurkuch ( Twic Central County, Wangulei)
11. Daniel Deng Manyok (Twic South County, Adubaar)
12. Deng Achiek Jok (Duk Payuel County, Payuel)
13. Michael Malual Wuor Reath (Duk Padiet County, Padiet)
14. Peter Latjor Chol (Duk Panyang County, Pajut)

(ST)