By Mak Banguot Gok (Makjohnson)
August 30, 2022 — This is a question that many South Sudanese still concern and bewildering of the answer. “What will be the next step after the graduation of the first batch of the Unified Forces?” Meanwhile, today the 30th of August in the year 2022, the four_years long awaited graduation of the necessary Unified Force which has been stipulated in the R-ARCSS is officially commenced after exactly four years of the long and unjustified cantonment. It’s at least an attention-seeking step ever taken since the signing of the Agreement on the 12th of September, 2018. It marked the beginning of the tedious Security Arrangement mechanism ‘implementation. With the forces graduated, the initial step began.
However, it is too early and, it would be premature if we hardly may have come to the conclusion that the work is finally being done. We are at the initial stage and more challenges as usual is inevitable. People of South Sudan are still worrying of the possible impasses that will stop the prospect short. The graduation might end up at John Garang Mausoleum because the parties are going back to their unhelpful political wrestling. As usual, the parties will cite all the unjustified excuses to cover up their inability to establish the national army. They shamelessly talk of funding constraints and other nonessential things.
The TROIKA ‘members’ countries that were seen as the providers of the very little services to the trainees have given up and withdrawn their financial support from financing the peace implementation. They argued that the parties to the Agreement behave in a way that doesn’t meet the standard promises. All the potential partners whose contribution affects the process abstained and citing lack of commitment from Juba whence it unjustly extended the timeframe of the R-ARCSS for another two years. Even representatives from the main funders (TROIKA) are not participating in the event which is a clear indication that the task is on the two men (Kiir and Machar) to cater for what’s needed whilst pretending to be going on with the implementation.
The reality behind the four years delay is unknown. The Agreement is largely ignored and the parties remain certain that 75% of the Peace Agreement is either omitted or entirely not implemented. What prevents the parties from breaking their deadly contention during the last four years? What is now motivating them to take this step? This is where to begin your own undertaking of the situation involved in the Peace Agreement ‘implementation arena. The graduation of the Unified Forces happened after a mounting pressure from within and outside the country (the fact that R-TGoNU was nearly isolated and discarded by the world and people of South Sudan in particular.
It was controversial what prompted Kiir and Machar plus their cronies to finally agree after four years. They are not preparing and never being truthful to one another of what will come next after they celebrate the graduation ‘event. There will be questions right from the 1st of September, 2022. There still remains the tougher job that requires realistic commitment from the same R-TGoNU. The first is the redeployment of the Unified Forces”. The deployment comes on the top of the mechanism for the Security Arrangements clause. It is not only to perform the completion parade and leave the soldiers on their own mercies as usual. After graduation marks the end of their long and overdue training, they need to be immediately deployed and distributed to their designated points of services. Now after the graduation, it appears very clear that there is no preparation, nor does it seem the R-TGoNU is certain about it. Imagine over 60,000 soldiers that are marking the completion of their four years long training will remain roaming between their previous cantonment sites and civilian lives for survival.
It has been a daunting task for the R-TGoNU to provide food and drinking water to the few thousands of trainees whence in the cantonment sites. We all know the astonishing living condition of the trainees during their last four years in the training centers. And, without almost everything for the soldiers to sustain their lives in the training centers, only a few thousand or hundreds of the recruits were living in the camps. Lange number of the cantoned forces have deserted and resorted to other means for living. It was only once the announcement was publicly made about the possibility of the graduation that tens of thousands have returned to their groups and the number swelled too high.
In this regard, there are no military barracks to accommodate that very huge force even for a few days whilst waiting for the necessary dispatches to their designated deployment destinations. There are no operational barracks in the States where the bulk of the Unified Forces intended to be shipped to. Transportation means nonexistent.!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
