Women of the Akobo area who have lost their husbands as a result of the current civil war say they are tired of war, displacement and harsh living conditions and they call on the country's two warring parties to quickly reach a peaceful conclusion to the current crisis.

Nyanchiew Ding, a widow and mother of four children, says her husband was killed in violence in Malakal. She has since struggled to earn food for herself and her four children. She does hard jobs like harvesting grass, fencing, selling firewood, and mining sand from the bottom of the Akobo river.

Typically, she said she digs a full basket of river sand and carries it about 500 meters where she can sell it. She says it is hard work and difficult to earn enough money to make up for the high food prices.

Nyanchiew says she is asking the leadership of the two warring parties to quickly end the war for the sake of the ordinary South Sudanese. She told Radio Tamazuj that she regularly hears news that peace is going to come but up to know she does not know what is really happening at the peace talks.

Meanwhile, Nyagoa Biel Hoth, a mother of three and a refugee of the conflict, says that she has been separated from her husband who has taken refuge at the United Nations base in Bor. She pointed out that her husband cannot provide financial support or even emotional support or advice to her and her three children because telephone networks have been shut down in all areas controlled by SPLM/A-IO.

She explained that she depends currently on carrying sacks of food items from World Food Programme stores to distribution fields on food distribution days to earn her a living. She said she can carry over 100 sacks a day and earn 25 SSP in reward.

Nyagoa said peace could be the only way to end the suffering of South Sudanese women like her and urges women-supporting organizations to help women help themselves in Akobo East by providing them with tools like tailoring machines and setting up businesses for women's groups in the county.

A WFP official who did not want to be named told Radio Tamazuj that they deliberately gave only women the chance of working on food distribution days in order to support women in the area.

Joseph Joul Tot, an official of the South Sudan Relief and Rehabilitation Agency (SSRRA), the humanitarian agency of the SPLM/A-IO, said that for far there are no organization with projects that support women particularly in Akobo East County.

He also claimed that over 1200 displaced households mostly women and children in Akobo have not been given food by any humanitarian organization since February 2015 and are in need of food.

According to the county SSRRA, there are over 46,000 displaced households from the neighboring counties depending on food aid from WFP living in Akobo East County.

Photo: Nyanchiew, a widow living in the Akobo area, digs river sand to earn a living