The former commissioner of the now-defunct Akob County in Warrap State, Karlos Maluil Makuek, has accused Governor Aleu Ayieny of ordering the killing of two men by firing squad on 12 November.
Maluil alludes that last Thursday 11 November, General Aleu ordered the arrest of three young men in Awul Payam on theft charges, and they were summarily executed the next day.
“On 11 November 2021, the governor of Warrap State, Hon. Aleu Ayieny, through his notorious officer called Madut Akol, arrested three persons from our area,” Maluil said. “They are Dol Manyang Dol, Majok Awan Dut, and Laul Koor Abo who were found in Awul market just taking tea and were arrested and taken to an unknown location. On 12 November, two persons were killed on the orders of the governor, Dol was killed and Majok Awan was killed.”
He says that the summary executions amounted to extrajudicial killings which are unfair.
“What the governor did to these two people is not fair because if you accuse them of theft, you should have arraigned them in court such that it is the court to convict them based on the crime they committed,” Maluil says.
The former commissioner urged President Salva Kiir and the Human Rights Commission to institute a committee to investigate Governor Aleu.
Reacting on the matter, Warrap State’s information minister, Ring Deng Ading, dismissed the reports of summary executions by the governor but confirmed that two people were killed last week in a road ambush by the suspected criminals.
“That is a lie. That is propaganda, there is nothing like such information,” Minister Deng said. “What I know is that the people who got killed were passengers coming from Aliak and on reaching close to Warrap town, they got ambushed on the road and two people were killed on spot and one person was injured.”
He said the duo that was killed were employees of the state ministry of cooperatives and that authorities are working to apprehend their killers and that the public should disregard any information which aims at tarnishing the image of the Warrap State government.
“The government of Warrap State is not here to kill its citizens, it is here to bring law. Like those who just ambushed the people on the road, they have to be captured and taken before a court. We do not kill our citizens, that is a lie,” Deng added.
However, investigations carried out by Radio Tamazuj reveal that extrajudicial killings were reported in Warrap State earlier in April, a couple of months after General Aley Ayeiny was appointed governor in late January.
In April, five people, among them teenagers, were killed by firing squad allegedly on the orders of Governor Aley Ayieny, according to the families of those killed. They were accused of ambushing commuters and commercial vehicles.
The teenagers executed were Majok Deng Akol, 14, Madut Akol Agok, 16, and Achuil Kuol Bol, 17. The men were Lueth Akol Mou, 62 and Deng Madut Deng, 24.
According to sources, all the executions took place in Nyang Akoc, an area in Tonj North County.
At the time there was a long-running inter-communal feud and fighting between Pagol Payam of Tonj North and Kerek Payam in Tonj South Counties. The five executed Pagol Payam residents were accused of attacking a commercial vehicle that was carrying passengers from Kerek Payam back from Wau. In the incident, one passenger was killed and three others sustained injuries.
Eliseo Achuil, a youth leader in Nyang Akoc, confirmed to Radio Tamazuj that the five people were executed by firing squad in the presence of Governor Aleu and the county commissioner on 11 April 2021 in Nyang Akoc village, Tony North County.
“The incident happened in April, they were killed by firing squad near my home and their names are, schoolboys called Majok Deng, 14, Madut Akol Agok, 16, Achuil Kuol Bol, 17, and Deng Madut Deng, 27 and Lueth Akol Mou, 62,” Achuil said. “They were only five people and they were taken to a nearby forest in the presence of our Governor Hon. Aleu Ayieny Aleu and our commissioner Mr. Kuol Akoon Kuol. They came together and they took these youngsters plus the old man and killed them and I was present. They were shot dead at 6:56 pm almost to 7 pm (sic).”
Achuil said the five executed males were arrested after they ambushed a vehicle on the road while returning from inter-communal clashes.
“What they did was that there was inter-communal fighting between Pagol and Kerek Payams and when they returned from the fighting they came along the road and there was a car coming from Wau heading to Thiet Payam,” Achuil explained. “They met the car and in the process, they asked the driver who the people he was carrying were. The driver responded that these people are from Kerek Payam and one of the dead (executed) ones started firing at the tire of the vehicle and the people at the same time.”
He said the attackers were arrested by security personnel who informed the commissioner, who in turn informed Governor Aleu who said he would arrive at the village in two days to investigate the matter.
“When they (governor and commissioner) came, they were shown the suspects who ambushed the vehicle,” the youth leader explains. “The governor and commissioner left for Pagol center and when they returned to my village (Nyang Akoc), they took these youngsters plus the old man to the forest and shot them without investigation.”
Achuil says Governor Aleu asked the father of the passenger who was killed in the ambush what he wanted but he rejected blood compensation and said he wanted his son’s killer killed too.
“And then the Hon. Governor took them and killed them all without investigations,” Achuil concluded.
Akol Agok, the blind father of 16-year-old Madut Akol Agok, who was among the teenagers executed by firing squad still mourns his son blames the governor for not consulting the families of the suspects before summarily killing them.
“Tell me what to do, I am disheartened and confused. I do not have teeth and I am blind at the same time and my son who they killed was the one looking after me,” Agok laments. “If there is a government, let them tell me what killed my small child. I am still asking why. Should the parents not be consulted when their sons commit a crime? Why did the governor refuse to receive animal sacrifice and prefer human sacrifice?”
Ajiing Mabior, the area chief, says when the governor arrived in the village, he refused to accept the usual animal sacrifice which is done when a dignitary visits. According to the chief, the county commissioner of Tonj North requested the governor to accept the animal sacrifice but the latter said he was not interested in the animal sacrifice but human beings.
“I was there when he was arriving in the area because the chiefs are the ones who welcome any visiting government official. I brought the bull and I ordered my fellows to start the sacrifice and the county commissioner told him (Governor Aleu) to jump over the living animal before it is killed, but the governor told us to bring to him humans for sacrifice so that he will move to Pagol center,” Chief Mabior narrates.
He adds: “We took the bull away and the governor went away. It was a great surprise because we never witnessed one day any official that was welcomed with human sacrifice. And after he failed to get human sacrifice from us, he came back and killed four boys and one old man to fulfill his request.”
The chief revealed that the bodies of the five executed individuals have not been collected and that their bones are still in the bush where they were killed.
When contacted, the Tonj North County commissioner, Kuol Akoon Kuol, distanced himself from the incident and said he was not aware of any execution by firing squad but admitted knowledge of the vehicle which was ambushed between Wau and Thiet in April.
“I do not have information about such a thing (firing squad). What happened was that unknown individuals attacked a vehicle which was coming from Thiet to Wau. They killed one and injured four people on 7 April 2021 who belonged to Tonj South County while the attackers were from my County, Tonj North,’’ Commissioner Akoon said.
He adds: “There was a military force sent to the scene but it did not come back with any report because I was not around the county because there were some cattle raids between Unity State and Kongor areas and I spent some days there. I was not given any report about the arrests made so far in connection with that incident.”
According to reliable sources, Governor Aleu was tasked by President Kiir to restore order and stop sectional fighting in the state and that in the event he failed, President Kiir would take over the state himself. Analysts say Governor Aleu interpreted this to mean he could act ultra vires.
When contacted, General Aleu declined to comment and threateningly demanded to know how the matter became public.
Meanwhile, a South Sudanese human right defender and lawyer, Philip Anyang, says the continued extrajudicial killing in the country, and particularly in Warrap State, are a violation of human rights.
“Any extra Judicial killing completely undermines the law in South Sudan and any act of extrajudicial killing is a human rights violation,” Anyang says. “That itself is a violation of the constitution in the right of the person being affected, someone life is being taken through fire squaring.”
Anyang said South Sudan is no longer a jungle state but it is a country with its laws adopted from international laws which prohibit acts of human rights violations and should maintain human rights obligations where things are practiced within the context of the law.
“Things should be done under the law in South Sudan, there is nothing that should be done outside the law, laws are made to punish those who commit crimes,” Anyang says. “Execution by firing squad in South Sudan is unacceptable and should be condemned.”