At least seven people were shot and wounded during intra-sectional fighting among members of the Lith Section of the Pakam Community in Meen Payam in Lakes State’s Rumbek North County on Wednesday.
The clashes occurred after a youth moved his prize bull towards tethered calves leading to the bull knocking them. This triggered a fistfight between the two which escalated to a stick fight and eventually spiraled into a gunfight between the members of the sub-clans of the Lith Section in the Pook village of Meen Payam.
The police spokesperson in Lakes State, Major Elijah Mabor Makuac, told Radio Tamazuj on Friday that there is no police presence in the area but elders in the cattle camp intervened to stop the fighting.
“We registered clashes at a cattle camp in Meen Payam between sub-clans of the Lith Section in Rumbek North on 17 January. They clashed leading to seven people sustaining gunshot wounds but the elders controlled the situation,” he said. “According to the information we received, they just clashed in the cattle camp simply because one of the young men drove his bull towards a place where calves were tied. When the owner of the calves tried to advise him, they quarreled.”
“It resulted in fighting by the two persons and later escalated into a fight between their sub-clans,” Maj. Mabor added.
The police officer said they would identify the perpetrators, and those involved in that fighting, and arrest them.
According to Mabor, the area where the clashes took place has no road infrastructure, and the seven wounded people were carried to the Rumbek North County Hospital for medical treatment by their relatives.
“The area where the two sub-clans of the Lith Section of the Pakam Community fought has no road access to transport the wounded to Rumbek North County hospital but relatives of the injured from both sides carried their wounded on their shoulders to Maper Hospital in the Rumbek North County Headquarters,” he said. “This is what happened and this is how these victims were evacuated from that far to Maper for treatment.”
“We shall identify the perpetrators through the injured victims and then we shall find a way to arrest, investigate, and bring them to book,” Mabor concluded.