GOSS Minister Calls On Southerners To Peacefully Co-exist

24 September 2010 - (Juba) – The GOSS Minister for Humanitarian Affairs and Disaster Management James Kok Ruey, has called on southern Sudanese to foster peace through dialogue.

James Kok was speaking during a two-day South Sudan Peace Fund review conference in Juba on Thursday.

The conference was organized by PACT Sudan in partnership with the GOSS Ministry of Peace and CPA Implementation.

[James Kok]: “Go tell our people this is a message from our government; we don’t need more quarrel, we don’t need more theft of goats and cattle. We need people to be friendlier to one another. Let those who are your neighbors who have been fearing you believe that you are a brother and you are a sister to them so that they live in peace. May be before the ninth of July, we shall have another conference to evaluate how do we pass the ninth of July. Ninth of July is the end totally of the interim period. If you have marshes or what you call ‘toch’, recognize that others have the same interest over the same grazing land. They need water and they need grazing land for their cattle. Please be flexible, we need your animal and we need their animals, how do you do it? It is through the dialogue, through peaceful coexistence.”

Participants from all ten states in southern Sudan see this review conference important for their communities. Peter Gai Joak, the commissioner of Payinjiar county spoke to SRS.

[Peter Gai]: “I see that has something important for me given the fact that Payinjiar County is also one of the counties that is being affected by the conflict, especially the internal conflict like cattle raids and other problems that need to be solved through peace conferences. At the same time we also discussed about post referendum. All participants agreed that if we become independent, we also need internal peace initiatives within southern Sudan. There is a resource based conflicts and resource based problems always result into cattle raiding, resulting into internal conflicts.”

PACT Sudan manages South Sudan Peace Fund and has managed to successfully facilitate 16 peace related programs in southern Sudan through community based organizations.