The Governor Central Equatoria State, Emmanuel Adil Anthony, has formed an ad hoc committee to resolve tensions between Mundari cattle herders and local farmers in Lainya County.
The ten-member committee is tasked with investigating drivers of conflict and finding diverse mechanisms for dialogue and conflict resolution between Mundari Cattle keepers, local farmers, and community leaders in Lainya County.
The Inter-communal conflict recently left three civilians dead, four others injured and hundreds displaced in Lokurbang Boma of Lainya County.
The relationship between the Mundari cattle keepers and local communities in Lainya remained bitter for the last several weeks due to the conflict.
Aggrey Cyrus Kanyiwa, the chairperson of the committee, told Radio Tamazuj on Wednesday that the committee has been mandated to carry out grass-root peace dialogue with the conflicting groups to address the matter amicably.
“The committee is ready and has started its work in Lainya and we have already found out the root causes of the conflict and we are ready to address these issues whether it is caused by people in Lainya or the Mundari cattle keepers. We also need to address all these issues because we don’t want this conflict to continue in the area because what we want is peaceful co-existence among ourselves,” Kanyiwa said.
Last Sunday, the Mundari community in Terekeka agreed, during a peace conference, to resolve their differences peacefully in a bid to restore peace, reconciliation, and the return of Mundari cattle herders back to Terekeka County.
Kanyiwa said it is time to avoid communal conflicts but support efforts for peaceful co-existence in all the counties of Central Equatoria State.
“The conflict in Terekeka has been resolved peacefully and for those of you promoting violence on the social media and in other forms, it must stop immediately because we don’t want any bloodshed in Lainya, Terekeka, or Yei. What has happened must not be allowed to continue because we want peace and stability,” he added.
Civil society activists have repeatedly sounded that the lack of functional government structures at the local level contributes to inter-communal conflicts across the country.
The activists further repeatedly urged the parties to the revitalized peace agreement to ensure the complete formation of the state and county governments to deter future occurrences of conflicts at the grass root levels.