Yirol West Residents Urged To Contribute Food To The Army Lakes State government has announced a controversial appeal to residents in Yirol west to mobilize food stuff for the national army. 31 January 2014 By Gabriel Mayom
*RUMBEK, January 30, 2014 (Gurtong) -*The announcement was made on Thursday in Yirol West County under instruction of Lakes state military caretaker Governor Maj-Gen. Matur Chut Dhuol, saying everyone across seven payams of Yirol West County will contribute from his family meal just one tin of groundnut and one tin of sorghum making total two tins per household. Out of seven payams, only three showed up in the meeting and others did not provide the reason of skipping the meeting with Dhuol. The payams that were present in the meeting were Abang, Geng-geng and Yirol town. According to one payam administrator who requested anonymity, meeting was not organized and everyone was told to implement the instruction accordingly and if any administrator fails, there will be consequences. The three payams' administrators and chiefs were present but the others didn't attend. "We believe instructions were coming out from Governor Matur Chut Dhuol. What happened was that Yirol West County Executive Director Macuor Anyith appeared in front of us with papers and ordering us to speed up with implementation of order," said a payam administrator who attended the meeting. "The meeting was held while people were standing up in the compound of Yirol West County commissioner. The Yirol West County administrator gave us papers and he told us to immediately implement the orders - if anybody failed to impose it and then prepare for consequences." The instruction caused fresh tension between caretaker Governor Dhuol and Yirol West County residents accusing the former of pushing state into graveyard. The residents complained that they did not harvest this year due to lack of rain that made more crop dry up. Peter Ijong, a resident in Yirol West questioned Dhuol policy of imposing outdated policy of mobilizing food for the army. He stated that since 2005, when South Sudan signed a Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), the late Chairman Dr. John Garang de Mabior stopped communities from mobilizing the food item to the Army. "Where is governor Matur getting those orders from? How can we mobilize food for the army? The army has its own food from Juba." said Ijong. He said last year, he did not get a good harvest because there was rain problem. "The little food I have cannot be enough for me with my family. I received more than 10 people who fled conflict in Jonglei and I ate the little I had with them. I now get help from those IDP because they get the food from humanitarian agencies - now where will I get food as contribution to army?" Lakes State has thousands of SPLA troops deployed to quell down insecurity in the counties with big priority to put to an end to the army deserters who are running toward Unity state. Posted in: Home<http://www.gurtong.net/ECM/Editorial/tabid/124/ctl/CategoryView/mid/519/categoryId/1/Home.aspx> , Governance<http://www.gurtong.net/ECM/Editorial/tabid/124/ctl/CategoryView/mid/519/categoryId/6/Governance.aspx> , Humanitarian<http://www.gurtong.net/ECM/Editorial/tabid/124/ctl/CategoryView/mid/519/categoryId/8/Humanitarian.aspx> , Featured Stories<http://www.gurtong.net/ECM/Editorial/tabid/124/ctl/CategoryView/mid/519/categoryId/137/Featured-Stories.aspx> -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "South Sudan Info - The Kob" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/SouthSudanKob. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/SouthSudanKob/CAJb14oqiV%3D9gfj27NsoDjfnjbfi5FU1r%3DLGpY3if6QBK_ijrBQ%40mail.gmail.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
