Security operatives in the Jonglei State capital Bor arrested Abraham Aleu Anyieth, a civil servant and a photographer affiliated with the South Sudan Broadcasting Corporation (SSBC), on Wednesday night.
Athieng Aleu, Aleu’s wife, told Radio Tamazuj that her husband was picked from their home in Bor town’s Block-2 suburb on Wednesday night by a combined force of the police’s Criminal Investigative Department (CID) and National Security Service (NSS) operatives without an arrest warrant.
“Many security personnel arrived in a vehicle and demanded for Aleu,” she said. “He complied and they took him away.”
Aleu’s participation in the ongoing peaceful protests in Bor which have been ongoing for the last two weeks is believed to be the reason behind his detention. The demonstrations were sparked by the high cost of living and the delayed payment of civil servants and organized forces’ salaries.
Athieng urged relevant authorities, including the UN Human Rights Department, to intervene and help locate her husband.
For his part, Bol Deng Bol, the Executive Director of the Bor-based advocacy group, INTREPID South Sudan, said authorities in Bor are targeting protest organizers and activists, including himself.
“I am on the run because the NSS and CID are searching for me all over the place. They managed to arbitrarily arrest Journalist Aleu Anyieth last night at 9 p.m.,” he said. “The people they suspect to have supported or openly been in solidarity with the protesters are being hunted.”
Deng emphasized that peaceful protests are not a crime but a constitutional right for citizens in a democratic country.
The security crackdown on peaceful demonstrators contradicts Governor Mahjoub Biel Turuk’s recent order granting political parties the freedom to exercise their democratic rights, a significant step toward pluralism in the state.
Various civil society organizations and opposition parties have consistently expressed concern about the lack of civic and political space in South Sudan.