A local commanding officer with the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA-Juba) has denied reports that up to five people, mostly civilians, forcing residents to flee to their villages while others tried to flee to neigbouring Uganda.
Colonel Daniel Dut said he was surprised when he started receiving telephone calls from the general headquarters in Bilpham, located north of the capital Juba, talking about reports of fighting which had taken place on ethnic lines, resulting in the killing of people he said has no idea about them and the actual circumstances in which they lost their lives.
“Let me tell you, I know you media in South Sudan do not, these days, bother to verify what your sources tell you. When you hear people have been killed, you think the information given is correct and you go and publish it,” said commander Dut.
He added, “Now there is no problem at all in Yei but in the media, there is war. People have been killed and the town has been deserted. this is what we hear but it is safe and people are going about their normal business,” he explained.
The local commander said “rumormongers” have made the people in the area to live in constant fear and suspicion of one another, just to cause with mistrust and division.
“People are no longer walking together these days. They are never sitting together because they have been made to develop mistrust and install the culture of fear and suspicion. This is the work of rumormongers, who creates an imaginary stories from nowhere to cause confusion and division,” he said.
The military officer, however, admitted that there are people who wants to drive a wedge between the local people and the local command under him in the area.
“They come to us and say there are people preparing somewhere to attack you and they go to the local community, especially the youth and tell them to prepare by saying SPLA is preparing to attack because you are agents of change for better system,” he said. “We know people doing this and this was the reason I called for a meeting with the local chiefs last week. I want to hear from them how the SPLA forces and the civilians would work and live together,” he said.