President Salva Kiir’s order to maintain the name of the newly constructed bridge on Jur River as ‘Clement Mboro Bridge’ has drawn anger and disappointment from the local Luo Community.
Last week, Kiir issued an order maintaining the name of Clement Mboro on the newly built Chinese bridge on the Jur River in Western Bahr el Ghazal state.
Gabriel Dhal Yak, the Bahr el Ghazal State Luo Youth Chairperson, told Radio Tamazuj that the order did not consider the community’s interests.
However, he said the community will respect the presidential order for the sake of peace and stability in the state.
Yak said the presidential order favoured the neighbouring Fertit community and isolated the Luo people, who he said are the owners of the river where the new bridge was constructed.
Yak said the community will forever consider the bridge as their historical and monumental site in their future heritages.
Meanwhile, Luo chief of Roc-Roc Dong, argued that the local communities in the state were not consulted when the issue of naming the new bridge was initiated.
“We have three local communities in Wau, the Fertit, Dinka of Marial-Bai and the Luo. We were not called to sit down and discuss the name first as chiefs,” he said.
“To name the Bridge Clement Mboro means it is the name of someone. This name of one person should not engulf the whole state and, in my opinion, let it be named Wath-Maan Bridge, which means Women’s Bridge,” he added.
Edward Uguak Bido, another Luo youth leader, said: “We, the youth, are still rejecting the name Clement Moboro Bridge. One person from Fertit, Governor Sarah Cleto Rial, went to Juba and started suggesting the name Clement Mboro and the suggestion was accepted there. But we, the Luo community and youth, cannot accept this.”
Last week, Western Bahr el Ghazal authorities postponed the commissioning of the new bridge, citing insecurity reasons. This followed protests by a section of Luo youth over its naming.
In a statement run on the state-run SSBC last Tuesday, President Kiir also promised to form an investigation committee to travel to Wau and meet those rejecting the name Clement Mboro.
On 3rd October 2023, the Luo Youth Union petitioned the state assembly for the second time about the name given to the bridge constructed by a Chinese firm.
The petition was met by the arrest of the youth group’s deputy chairperson, Santino Madut.
In 2020, the Chinese government offered a bridge to the government of South Sudan and agreed to build it on the Jur River Bridge as its name.
In March 2021, China Tianyuan Construction Group Company Limited, together with China Aid for Shared Future, started the construction of the new Bridge with the signed document Jur River Bridge but one year later, the National Council of Ministers unilaterally endorsed a new name ‘Clement Mboro Bridge’ in honour of a South Sudanese politician who hailed from Wau county in Western Bahr el Ghazal state.