Wilson Thomas Yanga, Commissioner of Maridi County in Western Equatoria, has warned youths against spreading rumors and lies about the Dinka community. He made these remarks while addressing a public rally on Wednesday.
In his address, the commissioner said that there are rumors that some people in Maridi have been meeting to prepare to fight the Dinka. He dismissed this as just rumors circulated by people who want to incite violence between communities and cause insecurity.
Yanga slammed idle and lazy youths for stirring up fears and discontent against the Dinka, which is South Sudan’s largest ethnic group. His remarks come after recent violence in neighboring Mundri West and East counties.
“After the Mundri fighting, I said, where do these talks come from? They said we were assembling ourselves to kill the Dinka people. Honestly, I heard that from our sons and daughters in Maridi here two days ago if we tell the truth!” he said.
The Maridi youths who are spreading such talk are idle and drunkards, Yanga said. “Those people are lazy and they don’t have farms, they don’t have a bicycle, they don’t have homes. They just move from home to home, they drink alcohol with your money while frightening you people of Maridi that those people are planning to kill your children,” he explained.
Yanga warned that he was collecting information about these rumour-mongers and he would take action against them. “They shouldn’t think that I don’t know them, I know them, we have already known you. I know their names one by one, I can call them by name now.”
The commissioner said that he has ordered the security organs to arrest anyone spreading rumors in the county since he has the list of all the girls and boys who are already known to be intensifying rumors in the county and further called on all people in Maridi to be one people.
The rally lasted for one and a half hours and was attended by all the government organized forces, church leaders, elders, youths and women under the big trees in Maridi Bus Park.