A group of 250 community representatives from Jonglei State and Pibor Administrative Area signed a peace agreement after a people to people conference at Freedom Hall, Juba, on Wednesday January 27.
The two-day conference ended with a warning shot by President Salva Kiir as he urged the residents to desist from engaging in any other form of violence again.
The president told the delegates—comprising the youth, women and elders from Bor Dinka, Gawaar and Lou Nuer, Murle and Anhuak—that the government would not intervene again to stop violence.
He said, “Next time you go for fighting I will not come to help you again, and even, I will not appoint any committee to go and investigate the fight in the area,’’ the president said.
‘‘I have decided that any fight that takes place will not be stopped by the police or the military I will leave you to fight.’’
The City Review lists the 42 recommendations that the delegates envisaged as the ammunition against violence and to strike the elusive sanity button.
Child and Women Abduction
- End to child and women abduction
- Identifying and punishing those breaching the law
- Returning all the abducted women and children to their families
- Children trafficking and selling to be stopped and those found practising it to be penalised in exercise of the penal code
- Compensation for victims of abduction who have been injured or killed in the process
- Establishing systems and processes pertaining to the prevention of women and child abduction
Revenge and Arbitrary killings
- Stopping the revenge killings and prosecuting the perpetrators in formal courts and other applicable customary laws
Cattle Raiding
- Stopping cattle raiding and prosecuting the suspects in accordance with the penal laws and the customary laws
- Returning the stolen cattle to the owners and paying all the necessary fines that apply
- Branding or marking cattle for easier identification in case of a raid
Justice and Accountability
- Establishing special courts to handle cattle rustling, child and women abduction, rape and arbitrary killings
- Empowering the chiefs, traditional authorities and the customary courts to deliver their duty diligently
- Enforcing accountability for the perpetrators of crime through strict enforcement of laws that criminalise abduction, rape and cattle theft
- Reviewing penal code to ensure harsher punishment for the perpetrators of rape, abduction, killings and cattle theft
- Compensating victims of rape who are injured or killed in the process of heinous act
- Punishing traditional chiefs who keep criminals
Security and law enforcement
- Comprehensive and uniform disarmament of civilians in Jonglei State and the Pibor Administrative Area
- Strengthening the capacity to allow the police to arrest the suspects of the heinous crime and hand them over for prosecution
- Creating buffer zones that separate warring communities especially at Gadiang and border points and deploying unified security forces to monitor criminals
- Establishing prisons in Nuer, Dinka, Murle and Anyuak where the perpetrators of the crimes will be jailed
- Construction of feeder roads to connect various counties and payams for easier response to security situation
- Creating roads dividing Akobo and Pibor and deploying troops there
- Improving network coverage for easier communication and coordination of security
Socio-economic empowerment and peace-building
- Providing empowerment programs to the youth through vocational training centres to create jobs
- Promoting dialogue and reconciliation from the grassroots to the top
- Upgrading Juba-Pibor road to ease the trade
- Providing social amenities like schools, health facilities and clean water to help the communities
- Creating unified cultural and sporting activities that bring the youth from various communities together
- Using the media to promote peaceful coexistence in the region
The remaining 11 resolutions revolved around humanitarian intervention, relations with neighbouring communities and implementation of the resolutions.
President Salva Kiir ordered for the establishment of the implementation committee represented by delegates from various communities to roll-out of proposals.