Kalany Bolies Kueth, the chairperson of Bentiu Youth Forum, a youth group based inside Bentiu IDP camp, fled the camp after the police Criminal Investigation Department (CID) stormed the IDP camp at night arresting at least six people including Bolies’ wife and a 14-year-old boy.
This breach of the IDP camp by the security operatives came days after Bolies and colleagues wrote a statement welcoming the decision by the Council of State last month to slap Governor Manytuil with a vote of no-confidence over recent extra-judicial killings in Mayom County.
His colleagues John Jal Yoal, Stephen Liep Tap, and Gatwech Majak Deng as well as his wife were arrested after Bolies fled the camp, with security officials asking the four men to disclose Bolies’ whereabouts.
Speaking to Sudans Post on Sunday from undisclosed location, Bolies said the state government is hunting him down with an intention to possibly harm him.
“I, as the chairperson [of the youth organization in the camp], was targeted and most of my family members were tortured. They were attacked at home and tortured including my pregnant wife,” he said by phone.
“They have been hunting for me in every location here, so I am not steady, the issue has not been resolved and the government is very serious about me,” the outspoken youth leader added.
Bolies accused the state gubernatorial security advisor Salaam Maluet of standing behind the efforts to get him arrested and possibly harmed, saying a court cannot dispatch security personnel to arrest him at night.
“The state security advisor ordered those security organs from C.I.D and they came after night and this worried me because if security personnel is sent at night at around 2:00 pm to attack people that are not the government now,” he said.
He accused security officers deployed to protect civilians at the camp of collaborating with external security forces which he said is against the protocols put forth before the UN peacekeepers deployed to guard the camp left.
“We came to realize that people have been allowed by commanders at the gate, especially those working at the gate, they allowed security to come and arrest people at Bentiu IDP camp, and that shows that they have collaboration,” he said.
He called on a unity state government to improve the deteriorating security situation in the area so that it restores hope in the people to return to their homes.
“We as a youth in IDP camp and youth in Bentiu, we lost hope because there are a lot of practices which are going here, people are being hunted at night, people are being arrested and sometimes people are killed before judgment and people are tortured when arrested,” he said.