Citizens in Torit County of Eastern Equatoria State have thanked the authorities for ensuring a peaceful festive season over the Christmas and New Year’s celebrations.
Speaking to Radio Tamazuj on Monday, several residents of Torit said Christmas and New Year celebrations were generally peaceful in the area.
Susan Edward Oduho, a resident of Torit town, said: “Torit was peaceful during celebrations, but there is serious hunger. I may be happy, but some people could not even afford clothes for their children during the celebrations, and this will not make someone happy.”
She called for peace and stability across the country to give children a better education. “We don’t want conflict in South Sudan, we need peace, and we need children to go to school. We need food for all, so this is our expectation,” Susan said.
Anna Idwa John, another resident of Torit town, said Christmas was celebrated peacefully without any problem, but there was hunger.
“My message to the people of Torit is to stay in unity and peace, and also, we need to educate our children to eradicate poverty. So this is my message to everyone in Torit here so that the condition of last year must change this year,” Idwa added.
Anthony Loma, a nurse and a resident of the Enyif area in Torit County, said: “Starting from Christmas, nothing bad happened. People celebrated well, including the New Year. This year we want our communities to go for agriculture. We need our people to go for bush clearing for agriculture because we need food.”
For his part, the Director of Information and Public Relations in Eastern Equatoria, Colonel Mathew Ochan Jacob, confirmed that the security situation remained peaceful during the festive season.
“We deployed forces from Torit to Kapoeta from the south to the east and from the north to the west. We had deployed forces in all the areas, and nothing went wrong. The whole state was peaceful,” he concluded.