Kiir, Machar failed people of South Sudan, says US lawmaker

JUBA — South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir Mayardit and his first deputy, Dr. Riek Machar Teny, have failed the people of South Sudan by refusing to implement the 2018 peace deal, U.S senator said.

U.S Senator, Patrick Leahy slammed Kiir and Machar for extending what he called “unpopular authoritarian rule” for three years without the consent of the people of South Sudan.

“It is no secret that President Kiir and his Deputy Machar have made the conditions for holding free and fair elections impossible, for all the reasons noted earlier,” Leahy said in a statement extended to Sudans Post on Sunday.

Leahy said the country’s leaders have done nothing to prepare for elections, preferring instead to retain power by default.

“By fomenting civil unrest and violence and threatening and arresting their critics, they have transformed the peace agreement into a meaningless document,” Leahy said.

He said the rule of Kiir and Machar has brought what he called “dictatorship, corruption, violence, and misery” to the country.

“The sad reality is that while the South Sudanese people won their independence from Sudan, they remain captives of the same ruthless and corrupt warlords who created so much ethnic conflict, bloodshed, and misery during the civil war and who have not been held accountable.”

“They simply reinvented themselves as political leaders, with a stamp of legitimacy from the international community, while continuing to act like the warlords they are and always were.”

U.S senator said the two leaders showed no interest in implementing the 2018 peace aims to end more than 6 years of civil war.

He added that the leaders showed no interest in the welfare of their people.

He said they showed no interest in anything except holding onto power, avoiding justice, and enriching themselves.

“The ethnic and political violence, displacements, and destruction of villages and food stocks perpetrated against South Sudanese civilians in different parts of the country, including by forces loyal to them, must stop.”

“The arbitrary arrests, sexual assaults and rape, forced disappearance, and killings of religious, civil society, and political leaders must stop, and justice is done for the victims.”