A top army general in the South Sudan’s national army, the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA), has resigned from the government, accusing President Salva Kiir and SPLA leadership of pursuing a tribal agenda in the country.
Lieutenant General Thomas Cirillo Swaka, the Deputy Chief of General Staff for Logistics in the SPLA army, is the second highest-ranking officer to resign after Gen. Bapiny Monytuil since clashes erupted between government troops and opposition fighters in July last year. Swaka hails from Equatoria region.
In a letter of resignation seen by Radio Tamazuj today, Gen. Thomas Cirillo accused President Salva Kiir and the SPLA Chief of General Staff Paul Malong of deliberately orchestrated planned violations of the signed peace agreement in August 2015 which caused fighting in the capital Juba in July last year.
Cirillo said President Kiir and his Dinka leadership clique have tactically and systematically transformed the SPLA army into a partisan and tribal army that targets non-Dinka tribes.
He further said the SPLA, police and other security organs systematically recruited Dinka from the President Kiir and chief of army staff’s home region, claiming other tribes and Dinkas who disagreed with President Kiir’s policy were sidelined.
Cirillo pointed out that soldiers from the Dinka ethnic group have been strategically deployed in non-Dinka areas to implement the policy of land occupation.
“The President and these SPLA officers have systematically frustrated the implementations of the peace agreement and pursued the agenda of Jieng Council of Elders (JCE) of ethnic cleansing, forceful displacement of people from the their ancestral lands and ethnic domination,” he said.
“At this juncture, I can no longer continue to be part of the ongoing destruction of our beloved country by the same army,” he stressed.
The SPLA general accused the Mathiang Anyoor tribal militias of burning villages, grabbing land, especially in Equatoria, Shilluk land and Western Bahr el Ghazal.
File photo: Thomas Cirillo Swaka/Radio Tamazuj