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Sudan

NGOs in Sudan become target as peace returns

By BOB ODHIAMBO, Special Correspondent
The going is getting tough for many non governmental organisations operating in South Sudan, due to an unlikely reason - peace.

The Comprehensive Peace Agreement struck with the help and blessing of many international NGOs turns to have had a flipside that few anticipated.

"The peace is yet to deliver tangible dividends to the many Sudanese who still live in very poor conditions," says a field operations director with one of the biggest international NGOs. "NGOs represent the only organised systems the people know and the people have begun expecting NGOs to provide services that only governments can provide."

Lois Anei Kuei, Governor of Warrap State captured the mood in Southern Sudan when he enumerated the problems facing his people during a recent meeting with the NGO representatives the area. "Ours is a sea of problems. We are starting from ground zero. In my state alone, I have about 1.8 million people waiting to be reintegrated," he said. "How do I establish a state machinery, provide a civilian livelihood for former soldiers, calm the volatile hostilities between some of our tribes? Where do I start from?"

The kind of help he was requesting depicted his desperation: Police vehicles to help fight crime, construction of his offices and supply of computers to his staff. "Go tell the people that we are here," he concluded. "Tell them that you have friends in this part of the world who have fallen into a deep well and need their help to get out."

There are about 40 international NGOs and UN agencies that have operated under the banner of Operation Lifeline Sudan (OLS) since 1989 in Southern Sudan, providing humanitarian assistance throughout the war ravaged and drought afflicted regions of the south.

The war gave the South Sudanese a preoccupation, or at least something they could blame their misery on. The peace is giving them too much free time to consider their plight more closely.

"Because the Government of South Sudan is yet to begin being felt in the grassroots, NGOs who have over the years found their way to the deepest corners of Southern Sudan are becoming the ones to answer for the missing links," says an expatriate food aid monitor.

The demands from the local people are becoming more aggressive. In one area, they downed their tools, demanding a pay hike.

"It is quite a paradigm shift for some of us who have been here since 1998, when we used to pay our staff with a packet of salt and some secondhand clothes," says a senior NGO staffer in the area. In another area, employees boycotted work demanding the sacking of a West African staff member.

"It's as if suddenly the local people are finding their voices and are becoming more vocal. It is both good and bad - good that they now seem to be getting more involved in issues that concern them, but bad in that they are using their newfound voice to force NGOs to hire relatives and to influence where to place projects meant for the whole community," says the official.

Increasingly, expatriates are becoming targets. Recently, a Kenyan worker hired to fumigate large storehouses used by World Food Programme to store food aid was accosted by an armed local man demanding money.

In another incident, an expatriate technical officer who had reported a car part missing ended up being declared the culprit and was locked up in jail.

"Some local people incite the masses against expatriates, saying that we are earning money meant for them," says an international aid worker. In one area, local people come into the staff mess and demanded the food meant for expatriates.

"We cannot stop them; if we do, they will threaten our lives and force us to leave the area," says an area programme manager.

The peace has also brought to the fore some unresolved conflicts between tribes and clans in South Sudan. The conflicts had been suspended to concentrate on the bigger enemy, the Khartoum government. However, with the peace deal in place, the old conflicts are being revisited. World Vision, CCM-Italy and VSF-Germany have evacuated their staff from Gogrial East and Gogrial West counties due to clan fighting.

"It is a great challenge for us.

We are faced with a situation where sometimes war is seen as the only way to resolve misunderstanding.

We plan to start engag-ing the community leaders to consider other ways of resolving local conflicts," says Gerald Wagana, World Vision director of emergency relief and disaster mitigation in South Sudan. World Vision is undertaking an epic journey to foster peace between the Nuer and Dinka, the two largest tribes in Southern Sudan. The two communities have a history of conflicts over grazing land, cattle raids, and abduction of women and children.

The communities have now agreed on a location known as Wanceui, on their common border, on which a school, a borehole, a community centre and a health facility for use by both communities will be built.