Juba, South Sudan,
August 15, 2022 — South Sudan’s Minister of Cabinet Affairs announced that graduation of the Necessary Unified Forces (NUF) will kick off on the 30th of this month.
Dr. Martin Elia disclosed after a meeting of the Presidency in Juba on Wednesday afternoon last week.
The Presidency’s meeting was chaired by President Salva Kiir, and attended by First Vice President Dr. Riek Machar and Security Advisor Tut Gatluak.
Also present in the meeting were senior government officials and members of the security mechanisms.
In the statement, Dr. Martin said the graduation of more than 52,000 forces will start in the Greater Equatoria region. More than 26,000 forces are expected to graduate from nine centers.
“There are some 26,508 forces of the mixture of the army, national security, and police in nine centers in Greater Equatoria, they are ready for graduation…, so in about 20 days’ time we will have the forces paraded and graduated as per our roadmap. ” Dr. Martin announced.
The forces include the VIP protection forces, army, police, national security, prison, and civil defense.
In centers in the Greater Equatoria region, the forces are expected to graduate from Gorom, Maridi, Morota, Owinykibul, Muni, Rajaf, Lologo, Rambur, and Agut-Makur.
After adjourning the graduation several times, Dr. Martin Elia told the media, the Presidency resolved to graduate the forces at the end of this month.
“We also have 15,682 in five stations in Greater Upper Nile, and we have 9,812 in three centers in Greater Bahr el Ghazal. These forces are ready to be graduated and we have agreed that they will be graduated by the 30th of August this year.”, he emphasized.
According to the 2018 revitalized peace deal, 83,000 unified forces drawn from various parties to take charge of security during the ongoing transitional period should be graduated.
Tens of thousands of forces have been assembled and trained at various cantonment sites and training centers across the country since 2020; however, a number of trainees are reported to have died of starvation and sickness in cantonment and training sites as they awaited the graduation that never came.
The government was unable to graduate the forces for the last two years, attributing the reason to the lack of funding and arms embargo.
