The Politics of Wun-Weng in South Sudan: From Historic Liberation Struggle to Farcical Dynastic Patronage
The Crown Prince vs Madam Wun-Weng
By PaanLuel Wël, Juba, South Sudan
Thursday, 28 August 2025 (PW) — Historians in the future will wrestle to comprehend the incomprehensibility of today’s South Sudan, For instance, how is it possible that a nation which fought for over fifty years to free itself from Khartoum’s oppressive rule has now surrendered to the misrule of one man in the person of President Kiir Mayardit? So comical has the dynastic patronage degenerated that were President Kiir to decree his pet dog as a senior government official this evening on SSBC, the public would outdo each other in offering sycophantic applause and ritualized congratulations to His Excellency Jong’e Bäny.
South Sudanese people shed blood and endured untold suffering for independence. Yet fourteen years later, their hard-won sovereignty has been captured by a clique of liberators-turned-rulers who have bankrupted the state, impoverished the people, and now treat government as private family property. President Salva Kiir has not only presided over economic collapse and endless wars, but has also begun appointing his own children, most recently his daughter, Madam Wun-Weng, now elevated to a senior government post and openly touted as his anointed successor.
The most striking part of this saga is not President Kiir’s audacity, but the reaction of the civil population, the heroes and heroines of the liberation struggle. Instead of outrage, we see muted applause and ritualized congratulations. Why has a proud nation that once fought Khartoum tooth and nail become so subdued in the face of homegrown misrule? To the unlucky historians of the future, the answer lies in a toxic blend of exhaustion, fear, and survival.
South Sudan is a nation fatigued by war. Decades of liberation struggle were followed by two brutal civil wars after independence. Ordinary people are too exhausted to mobilize; survival takes precedence over resistance. Add to this a state built on militarization and fear, where dissent is punished by arrests or exile, and silence becomes a survival strategy.
But silence is also bought. The SPLM-led government runs on patronage where access to jobs, contracts, and even food aid flows through loyalty to those in power. Communities congratulate appointments not out of genuine belief, but because proximity to power may mean survival for their impoverished families.
The liberation movement that once promised freedom has mutated into a dynasty. And South Sudan is not alone: Zimbabwe, Uganda, and Angola offer similar stories of liberators clinging to power by turning revolutionary legitimacy into a shield for corruption and authoritarianism. The tragedy in Juba is that this degeneration has unfolded with unprecedented speed.
To the future generations who will inherit this mess, I present seven accounts, framed through the hindsight of presentism, why my generation, Rïny bë thou ke dal, as foretold by Prophet Ngundeng Bong, has endured with dignified humility the farcical misrule of a single man.
- The liberation struggle exacted a catastrophic toll in terms of generations displaced, millions dead, livelihoods shattered. Independence in 2011 promised dignity, justice, and prosperity, but successive civil wars (2013, 2016) quickly disillusioned the population. The result is liberation fatigue, a society so exhausted by conflict that it prioritizes survival over political resistance. In such a context, authoritarian excesses are endured rather than actively resisted.
- The SPLM-led government functions as a patronage machine rather than a meritocratic state where access to government translates into access to food, education, jobs, and security. Appointments, even of the president’s children, are accepted because they feed into patron–client networks that keep communities and leaders alive. Congratulating an appointment, however absurd, can be less about loyalty and more about securing a lifeline.
- South Sudan is a state built on the gun where security forces are loyal to the presidency and have historically repressed dissent. Citizens know the risks of outspoken criticism: detention, disappearance, or exile. In such an atmosphere, fear compels silence, and silence is often masked as polite congratulations.
- During the liberation struggle, Khartoum was the unifying enemy whereas, today, politics is fractured along ethnic, clan, and regional lines. What might appear as national betrayal to one group can be rationalized as political opportunity to another. This fragmentation prevents the emergence of a unified civic response, leaving the population divided and therefore subdued.
- The opposition is either co-opted, militarily weakened, or discredited by its own history of violence and corruption. Figures like Dr Riek Machar, Dr Lam Akol, or Comrade Pagan Amum do not inspire trust as reformist alternatives. With no moral leadership or institutional base, citizens conclude that “changing faces changes nothing.” This cynicism fosters resignation rather than rebellion and in turn makes Kiirdit’s dismal misrule attractive.
- South Sudanese social norms value public politeness and ritualized congratulation. In a repressive context, this dhuëëng custom is weaponized as people congratulate not out of genuine joy but as a cultural coping mechanism, a survival tactic that allows them to avoid confrontation while privately harboring bitterness.
- South Sudan is not unique as, across Africa, liberation movements, from Zimbabwe’s ZANU-PF to Uganda’s NRM, often morph into authoritarian dynasties. Their historic role as liberators grants them enduring legitimacy, even as they hollow out institutions, bankrupt economies, and silence dissent. South Sudan is replaying this tragedy, only in an accelerated form. In just 14 years of independence, it has shifted from liberation idealism to entrenched authoritarian succession politics.
Still, the subdued applause from the impoverished civil population is not wholesale consent. Beneath the surface lies deep resentment. What holds it in check is the absence of credible alternatives, the fragmentation of society along ethnic and clan lines, and the sheer exhaustion of a people who have known nothing but war and displacement.
But history teaches us that systems built on fear and patronage are brittle. If oil revenues collapse further, if famine bites harder, or if a younger generation, unburdened by the myth of liberation, demands change, today’s silence could give way to tomorrow’s storm as history recorded twice, 18 August 1955 in Torit and 16 May 1983 in Mading-Bor.
For now, South Sudanese people watch as their revolution eats its children, while a liberation hero tries to turn the republic into a family dynasty. It is a betrayal not just of the people, but of the very ideals for which so many people sacrificed their lives.
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