Juba, South Sudan
July 4, 2022 — South Sudan, the world’s youngest nation, will not celebrate her 11th independence anniversary due to lack to budget, according to government officials.
Speaking to the media, the national minister of information and government spokeman, Hon. Michael Makuei Lueth, said the government does not have a budget to celebrate the independence anniversary.
Since 2013, the world’s youngest nation has not organized an official Independence Day celebration and officials blame it on war and lack of money.
Michael Makuei told reporters on Friday that the administration had postpone the celebration once again so that it could use the available limited resources to finance Security Arrangements and other priorities.
The government’s spokesman said President Salva Kiir will address the nation on the evening of July 8, 2022, as part of the celebration.
Makuei said the local governments in the states and administrative regions are allowed to recognize the day.
Makuei believes the graduation of the unified forces, who have been in the training facilities, should be the main focus of attention at the moment instead of organizing “large public rallies.’’
“After thorough deliberation, the cabinet found out that yes, there is a need for us to celebrate, but the celebration will be of different types other than being the normal celebration, because at present there are so many issues at hand that we need to address and making that big celebration means a lot of expenses,” Michael Makuei elaborated.
“This is what we have decided so that we avoid incurring more expenses at a time when we are preparing the little money that we have for the graduation of forces and the implementation of the agreement.’’, he added.
It is not the first for government to postpone the Independence Day celebration but each postponement has its own reason. For the last two years the Independence day celebrations were postponed on the ground that there was Covid-19 pandemic but the year before [2019] was postponed due to lack of finance.
