NP CEO visits South Sudan
Part I
It was just under a month ago that we, the NP team in South Sudan, hosted visitors from our headquarters. The new CEO of NP, Doris Mariani, and the Director of Programmes, Atif Hameed, spent 10 days in South Sudan, departing just a few days before the conflict broke out. The fighting began, unbeknownst to me until I landed, while I was flying to New York where I was traveling to meet my family for Christmas. I had used some of the time on that flight, still ignorant of what was happening on the ground, to write a story about their visit, feeling hopeful and energized about the work that we were doing and the progress towards sustainable peace we were seeing at the community level. By the time my flight landed, there was heavy fighting in Juba and the headlines in the international media suggested full-scale civil war was emerging.
As the scope and scale of the violence became clear, my own feelings of despair were being mirrored in the press. I felt foolish for having been writing about progress when tens of thousands of people were running in fear and hundreds if not thousands had been killed in this sudden and brutal outbreak. The airport was closed, I couldn’t return, some of our teams were stuck in areas where fighting was happening and it was spreading to other locations. I was being asked how this could be happening and what was the point of all of the work that had been done if this kind of brutality could re-emerge overnight like this. And in my immediate concern for my colleagues, our partners and the people of South Sudan, I found myself holding those same thoughts – but then I remembered what I have learned from years of working in conflict affected countries - the reality is that peace is complicated, it is more complicated than war. The road to peace is nonlinear, long and heavily laden with obstacles.
This fight that has now sent more than 150,000 people running, that has separated families, destroyed towns and killed and injured uncounted thousands is not the whole story of South Sudan. South Sudan is much more than the violent conflict that is portrayed; this current fight is not the future of South Sudan. This conflict is a story of a small group of people making decisions about power, access to resources and money, unhealed scars of war, and an unmet process of reconciliation and sense of inclusion. Most importantly, it is, as is the case in all wars, not the will of the majority. The silenced majority, the men, women, boys and girls of South Sudan, continue even today, to try to build normal, healthy lives. And for those of us representing the international community, it is time for us to move closer towards South Sudan, not pull away.
These past weeks have seen massive evacuation of internationals from South Sudan. Taking this space, erring on the side of caution when you are responsible for the safety of others is understandable. But as the situation stabilizes it is imperative that the international community moves back in to provide much needed aid for the humanitarian crisis and to support bringing about a peace process.
The NP team is doing everything possible to remain in the country to implement protection and violence reduction programming. To facilitate staff security and to consolidate resources, all the NP staff who were on duty over the holidays have been brought together in Juba where we are working in the displacement camps. We are analyzing the situation and are closely monitoring partners and national staff who had gone home to their villages for Christmas. What we know and what we are seeing is the incredible resiliency of the people of South Sudan. The continued commitment to peace and progress is evident - as one of our colleagues has reminded us, this has happened to all South Sudanese and we all need to work together to overcome it.
With this in mind, I want to go ahead and share the story I had written during those hours in the air a month ago. It is a story of some of the real people of South Sudan, those who with very few resources, against significant odds, are working together in their own communities to bring about peace. It is also a story that has not ended, our teams and partners are working or eager to get back to work wherever possible, refusing to allow war to be the only storyline of this complex and diverse country. These are the real people of South Sudan and we are proud to be working with and for them. They are the real future of South Sudan.
Part II - Doris and Atif’s visit
After spending the last 3.5 years as the Country Director of NP’s South Sudan program, I always enjoy welcoming people on their first visit to the world’s newest country. It is so interesting to see the place that has been my most recent home through the eyes of first time visitors, seeing the familiar through fresh eyes. To this end, we have just had the pleasure of hosting NP’s new CEO, Doris Mariani, and the Director of Programmes, Atif Hameed, in South Sudan for a 10-day visit. The whole country team was excited to have our VIP visitors from headquarters come to experience first-hand South Sudan and the work that NP is doing here.
Doris and Atif arrived on an overnight flight and hit the ground running. The first challenge for any South Sudan visit is getting through the Juba airport. As more and more people are flocking to the rapidly developing capital, the demand is outgrowing the small airport making the arrival process a little chaotic – it is a great way for visitors to dive right into the experience. Although it turned out that their luggage did not arrive with them, they burst out of the airport into the 40-degree heat with enthusiasm. We whisked them away to the country program office for a working lunch over the security briefing and introductions to the program support team. We had the opportunity to present in detail the work being done by the nine different field teams, focusing on how the program has evolved since 2010 to become the largest NP country team.
Given the size of the country and difficult logistics, we had organized to get moving out of Juba early the next morning. While Juba, as the nation’s capital, is growing every day with new buildings and businesses emerging seemingly overnight, the real story of South Sudan is out in the states. Early the next morning we were back in the airport catching a flight operated by the United Nations Humanitarian Air Service (UNHAS) to head north to the state of Northern Bahr el Ghazal (NBeg). Northern Bahr el Ghazal is situated at the border with Sudan and has a long, difficult history of being heavily affected during the civil war where it was the battle ground of the infamous muharleen, the horse-mounted militia, the Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) and the, at that time, rebel militia group, the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement. With a legacy of violent conflict, the communities living near the new border have agreed amongst themselves that it is time to live in peace and have formed a local mechanism called the Joint Border Peace Committee (JBPC) to work together to achieve that goal. The NP team is working with the JBPC, facilitating safe migration agreements, the protection of the trade routes and markets and the implementation of peace agreements throughout the communities living in the border area.
Bumping to a stop on the dusty airstrip outside of the state capital of Aweil we were met by the NBeg team led by Team Leader, Thiago Wolfer. Thiago, from Brazil, is an NP veteran, having served in both Guatemala and Sri Lanka before joining the South Sudan program. This is one of my favourite parts of visiting the field teams – seeing the NP landcruisers, flags flying, parked on the dirt airstrip from the plane as it is landing, jumping out and hugging everyone. Atif and Doris were right in the thick of it all, meeting the team, grabbing their luggage and piling into the vehicle, as if they had been there forever. We headed into town for a small tour and to meet two of our important government partners, the Coordinator of the State Peace Commission and the Director of the Relief and Rehabilitation Commission. I felt so proud of our team hearing the overwhelmingly positive feedback from both of these partners about the contributions NP is making in the area. The Peace Coordinator described NP as their most important partner in peace, saying, “We couldn’t be making this kind of progress without NP.”
Meetings and errands complete, we were back in the landcruiser heading out to the NP compound about an hour away in a small village called Wanjuk and giving Atif and Doris their first real South Sudan road experience. It is dry season now so they traded in the knee-deep mud experience for the spine-cracking, bounce of driving on hard packed dirt in the form of dry river beds.
We spent that evening sitting out under the stars, sharing stories and enjoying the quiet of the night. With electricity only provided by generator and no running water, it is simple and at times quite difficult living. Doris experienced her first bucket-shower and our joke was that while the accommodation was as simple as it comes, the view of that night sky made it a million-star rating.
The next morning, we were back in the landcruiser and headed up to the border. The team had organized for us to join them on a field trip to meet with the JBPC in the village of Majok Itu – the last point before crossing into Sudan from South Sudan. Distances are long and there are very few vehicles so, as usual, we picked up the members of the JBPC coming from the south. We were 13 in the vehicle, most of whom were Dinka known for their great height and consequently very long legs. As our National Protection Officer colleague Sylvester said, “we are tied up in here like sardines.” It was a three hour drive but rather than noticing the discomfort, we reveled in the sounds of enjoying nonstop chatter in a combination of Dinka, Arabic and English, everyone laughing, telling stories and explaining about their lives to Doris and Atif.
The meeting of the JBPC was a follow-up to the peace conference that NP had facilitated the previous week. Members from the Misseriya tribe had come from Sudan to meet their Dinka counterparts to work out the terms of an agreement to encourage a violence free migration. With the dry season setting in, the annual migration is about to begin with thousands of heads of cattle being driven into the south in search of water and grass which often results in conflict over the use of land, access to water and the destruction of crops. We sat in the shade of a big leafy mango tree, in a circle together with Dinka and Misseryia men and women who, supported by the NP team, were planning on how to disseminate the agreements to the broader communities.
After the meeting, Doris shared her thoughts on her third day in South Sudan: “the community sitting in a circle talking about how to really strengthen peace and what works at the ground level, learning more about what the needs are and what we as NP can do to support was absolutely invaluable. I think that our staff has done great work. There is so much to do here, I am very, very excited”
Watch the interview of Doris and Thiago Wolfer.
There is never enough time to see and do everything. South Sudan is large and diverse and we wanted Doris and Atif to get a chance to experience another location, so the next day we were back on a plane, heading to Rumbek, the capital of Lakes State. Off the plane and greeted by all 7 members of the Lakes State team, we were again running to meetings and briefings. The bright and energetic Team Leader, Canadian, Ashlyn Exley corralled us together so we could fit it all in. The Lakes State RRC Director told us, “NP is the most effective organization who brought real peace to Yirol West County and is now taking on more difficult conflicts here in Rumbek.”
Lakes State is experiencing significant inter-clan violence right now and the NP team is making every effort to support violence reduction initiatives and provide protection. The night before we arrived, the team had been out late in the evening doing protective presence in a community who were fearing a reprisal attack. Most of the women and children had temporarily been displaced so the NP team spent time with them patrolling the area, and raising concerns with the authorities to reduce the likelihood of an attack.
Early the next morning, Doris, Atif, and I joined the whole team who were helping to set up a peace conference with the youth of Rumbek North who had brought their conflict to NP asking for help. Setting up community events require all hands so we were there together with the youth group organizing drinking water, chairs, the agenda and transport for the participants.
Soon we were drawn outside by the sounds of women singing indicating that the members of the Women’s Peacekeeping Team had arrived. The spontaneous and harmonious singing of women in South Sudan is one of my favourite things – they sing while the work, they sing when they are happy, they sing when they mourn, the shared songs and multipart harmony identifying them as a community. I was joyful to see Ashlyn and Doris join in the dancing.
Women’s Peacekeeping Teams (WPT) are a key pillar of NP’s programming in South Sudan. WPTs are designed to facilitate increased participation of women in peace and security, supporting women to take leadership roles in ending violence in their communities. On this day, we were joining the WPT from the county of Rumbek Central on a field trip to meet with cattle keepers in the village of Mayom. There is currently a serious conflict between two clans in Lakes that has resulted in the death of more than 100 people this year alone. The WPT decided -- as no progress was being made -- to try to bring the fighting to an end by jumping in to take the lead. The group of 32 women, supported by the NP team, have been traveling to villages and cattle camps to talk to the men who are fighting and calling for peace.
On this day, we left half of the team at the peace conference and the other half of us were loading up with the WPT in 2 landcruisers to head out to the village of Mayom to meet with the fighters. Atif found himself one of only two men in a car filled with 16 women who, as soon as the doors closed started singing and ululating for the entire trip. One of the lovely traditions of the Dinka of Lakes State is that when you spend time with them, they bestow you with Dinka names. As we rattled along the dirt road, the women sang and discussed amongst themselves about what our Dinka names would be. I was called Mangor, meaning mother of peace, Doris was called Piath, meaning something good and most delightfully, Atif was called Aliar, man who is patient among women.
In the village, we spent 4 hours sitting under a tree, observing the discussions between the WPT and the men. In conflict situations, distrust is common amongst everyone. It had taken more than an hour for the men to observe our party from a distance to trust that the WPT, with the NP accompaniment had truly come in peace. Once they came forward, the women spoke to them in an unstructured way, taking turns to stand and share their pleas for peace and their stories about how the conflict was affecting them – about the fear that they felt and the deaths in their families. The men, while initially serious faced and stubborn, began to share their own stories – explaining that they only came to the meeting because they were women and they trusted that they were genuinely interested in peace. Men young and old shared how they were also tired of fighting, how they didn’t even know any more why they carried weapons and ultimately agreeing to come together in dialogue with the other clan.
As we loaded back into the landcruisers to head back to town, I asked Doris and Atif what they thought of the process. Atif shared that this is “truly a force for peace” and Doris noting the challenges of ending violent conflict - “it was so evident that peace is not fast, it is not instant and it takes time.”
Click here to watch the video.
Wistfully, the three of us were back at the airstrip the next day to head back to Juba. Time was passing quickly and we had high-level meetings to attend to in Juba before Doris and Atif had to return to Brussels. Meeting with the American Ambassador Susan Page, representatives from the EU delegation, UN agencies, the Protection Cluster and the NGO Coordination Forum after having been in the field helped enrich the discussions and place. We wrapped up their visit with a small staff Christmas gathering where our colleague Sammy shared a song with us that he had written about NP working for peace in South Sudan. Sammy is from the long troubled Jonglei State and has experienced ongoing violence yet every day he comes to work so he can work for peace. In Sammy’s words “I can see the NP soldiers dressing up in their uniforms, ready to whisper the words of peace – put your hands up NP, put your hands up NP!”