Economist Peter Biar says Kiir, Machar will be sent home in 2023

JUBA – South Sudanese activist and economist Peter Biar Ajak has urged the region and the international community to provide the badly needed security to protect voters during the general elections slated for end of the transitional period in 2023 so that they elect an alternative leader.

In an interview with the Kenya-based KTN News, Biar said the people of South Sudan are tired of President Salva Kiir and his first deputy Dr. Riek Machar Teny who refused to retire during the last year’s demand by People’s Coalition for Civil Actions.

“Last year, the people of South Sudan said that they are tired of Riek Machar and Salva Kiir and that these people should go home,” the outspoken South Sudanese economist and activist said.

“They refused to listen, and now elections are coming in 2023, we want the region and the UN to provide security so that we send them home once and for all,” Biar added.

The remarks by Peter Biar comes a week after a US senator called President Kiir and Machar warlords who have created an ethnic conflict and bloodshed against their people in the quest for power.

The US senator urged the two men to resign and give their people a chance to choose their leader, but President Kiir and FVP Machar have rejected the US senator’s suggestion saying they have rights to continue.

Kiir and Machar have also deferred over when, and how to organize the elections. Kiir has asserted that elections will take place in 2023 even without a population census.

Machar says he won’t accept to participate in that election unless the security arrangements provisions provided for in the revitalized peace agreement is completed so that a unified security sector is created to provide security to the polls.