A group of angry youth in Maban County, South Sudan’s Upper Nile State, has shut down the county Relief and Rehabilitation (RRC) offices, accusing it of failure to create job opportunities.
The RRC is an agency of the South Sudanese government. It is the operational arm of the National Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Disaster Management.
Juma Al Khor, deputy head of Maban County Youth, told Radio Tamazuj on Friday that they closed the RRC offices last week in protest against the institution’s failure to find job opportunities for youth with Non-governmental Organizations (NGOs) operating in the area.
“We closed the offices to demand our rights as the youth. As Maban youth, we see that the RRC has failed to give us our rights because the RRC staff members are incomplete, and we want the staff to be increased so that we can be represented well,” he said.
The youth leader also accused some staff of the Commission of corruption and misappropriation of property donated to them by humanitarian organizations.
“The closure of the offices is the only peaceful way for us to demand our rights, and as the people of Maban, we want to fight against corruption in the commission,” he said.
The angry and unemployed youth maintained that the Commission’s offices will remain closed until an agreement is reached with the authorities.
When reached for comment, Mumin Khidir, the acting commissioner of Maban County, confirmed to Radio Tamazuj that the offices of the Relief and Rehabilitation Commission (RRC) had been closed by the local youth. He pointed out that the offices of the Labour Department were also closed briefly.
“Based on the demands the youth submitted to the authorities in the county, the government is making efforts with the state government to find a solution that fulfills the demands of the young people by submitting several proposals,” he said.
“So the State Minister of Labor has approved the proposal submitted by the county government and is pushing for new staff to manage the labor office, and as a result, the labor office was reopened,” he added.
The local official stated that the county government agreed to close the Commission’s offices to prevent any tensions that might occur, describing the situation in the area as unbearable.
In July 2028, hundreds of youth from Northern East Maban County stormed offices of aid organizations as they demanded employment.
According to the South Sudan Bureau of Statistics, the unemployment rate increased to 12.70 percent in 2020 from 12 percent in 2019, which has been higher than general unemployment rates in East African countries. The unemployment rate measures the number of people actively looking for a job as a percentage of the labor force.
According to the 2008 Sudan Housing and Population Census, the youth constitute over 70% of the South Sudanese. It considers youth as anyone between 18-35 years.