there are a number of very important challenges that the new state is going to face. One of the challenges will be how the SPLA is professionalized and transformed, how the police maintains public order, how political power is going to be distributed through the new constitution.
As Southern Sudan morphs into the Republic of South Sudan, NEW TIMES has a conversation with Lise Grande, the Humanitarian Coordinator for Southern Sudan, on the achievements and the challenges that lie ahead:–
Q. Some weeks before Independence, you requested for USD200m – that is a lot of money. How do you think that you’ll get it?
The funding is to support the humanitarian plan. And that includes funding for the frontline NGOs providing the life-saving services, the health care, the water points, helping returnees from the north to integrate, and also programs in nutrition, programs in food. it’s a big operation. If you look at the number of people we are assisting and the amount we’re requesting, it’s a bargain.
Q. How many are in need?
If You’re talking about emergency food aid, probably about 1.4-1.5 million people could need assistance in case things go badly. It varies by sector, and we have a whole list of those – health, education. It’s on the basis of assessments done by professional people, led by the government, that the caseloads are calculated. We don’t just go to a place and guess how many people need aid.
Q. We have had a long period of crisis here. Donors may simply develop humanitarian fatigue – It’s tiring. Do you foresee a scenario where – despite the enormous challenges, people will just shut out, close their ears?
You can’t have 60 years of marginalization and not suffer. No schools, no health facilities. No water facilties. There are no roads. There is even no electricity grid. This is the real price, this is the legacy of having suffered from 60 years of marginalization. That’s why a new partnership, a new beginning for a new country, between the donors and the government is going to pave the way for government putting funding to address the marginalization and the donors, together, helping to overcome that, by expanding education, by expanding the health system – together in a new partnership.
Q. What do you foresee as a potential critical challenge for the new country?
South Sudan has come a long way. If you look at the achievements in the last six years, it has been breathtaking. Probably nowhere on the continent have so few people done so much in such a short period of time. Thirty two ministries were stood up, and 17 commissions. The judiciary has been established. For the first time in 24 years there were multiparty elections. Thousands of kilometers of roads opened. The number of children entering school has quadrupled. It’s absolutely remarkable.
But there are a number of very important challenges that the new state is going to face. One of the challenges will be how the SPLA is professionalized and transformed, how the police maintains public order, how political power is going to be distributed through the new constitution. During the drafting of the permanent constitution questions about decentralization and concentration of political power have to be addressed. How the economy is organized and oil distributed to ensure equal distribution — these are decisions that can’t wait. The government is going to deal with these sooner rather than later.
Q. So, how do you suggest that some of these questions be answered?
South Sudan is one of the most underdeveloped states on the face of the earth. That’s the cost of marginalization. No tarmac roads, electricity grid, public goods, and a massive capacity gap. There are countries with similar problems that have started to overcome them.
If you look at Ethiopia, you can see that part of the way they dealt with massive gaps in the healthy sector was to have what they called local doctors, barefoot doctors. These were health technicians who didn’t have the highest level of training but had basic training that allowed them to cover the widest area possible.
In Mozambique, there were mentors from other African countries that came in. Many stayed for years. This had phenomenal impact on allowing Mozambique to move forward. A UNDP program here, in conjunction with the IGAD countries, with Kenya, Uganda, and Ethiopia, is doing something similar. People from the region come in, spend time, several years, not substituting for public servants, but helping public servants do their job. That’s another great idea. Again when it comes to corruption, Mozambique had problems with corruption. And what they did is that they outsourced the Maputo Port. They asked Crown Agents to come run the port, temporarily, but they set up the system necessary to ensure that the port functions properly. In Kenya, to broaden the judiciary, they brought in outside expertise – not permanently – but temporarily to ensure transparency. That’s something that here, in south Sudan, we can all learn from.
Q. The humanitarian sector is tough to rate because, often, successes don’t easily lend themselves to quantification. That doesn’t stop people from wanting to know, for instance, what have you achieved? How many lives have you saved?
I think what we have seen here is that there were some really difficult times. In 2009 there were 400,000 people that were displaced. Last year the WFP was providing food assistance at some stage during the year to almost half the population. Because the government led, the frontline agencies worked round the clock, the donors were generous, what we saw was that these problems didn’t become a catastrophe. I think millions of people made it through the tough times, and are ready to start a new nation with a new beginning.
Q. Todate, what are some of the critical challenges that you have faced?
When you don’t have logistics, and there’s such a heavy rain, it can be exceptionally difficult to do your job. The fact that there is also such a large capacity gap has also impacted us. There are not enough partners and we always need more money. and insecurity has been a major factor. And there has been a series of bad harvests.
One thing we have been disappointed in is that there has been cases of interference in the work of humanitarian operations by the SPLA. Workers have been harassed. Compounds have been looted. We’ve had assets commandeered. We have actually lost staff as well.
Q. But the army says that they haven’t done that
We have found that, in discussing with high levels of the army they recognized the problem. They have been very good about saying we need this to change. But of course the SPLA is going through transformation and that can often make it difficult to command and control. We have had very good dialogue with the army about this. We are positive that things are going to change.
Q. We are on the eve of independence. What are the immediate worries?
The fact that we don’t have a full agreement with the north, that there’s all this trouble in the transitional areas. We’re not even sure about the status of these southerners in the north.
If you plan for the worst, it’s our responsibility to be ready. This is part of the reason we are prepositioning emergency stocks all over the south. It’s something we did for the Referendum. Before the Referendum we prepositioned three months stock of emergency supplies in a hundred hubs all throughout the south. The Referendum was great. After the Referendum we have been using those stocks to support the people that were displaced from Abyei, for example. We are doing the same thing now. We are prepositioning stocks and reinforcing our presence along the border.
Q. How does independence affect the UN humanitarian plan?
Our hope is that as government systems – health, water, education – as these systems build up, we on the humanitarian side can then decrease our interventions. What you don’t want to start doing is cutting back on the delivery of basic services by the humanitarians if the government systems aren’t there. There would be a big gap and it would be the people suffering. On the other hand you don’t want the humanitarian systems to crowd out the government systems.
Q. How can we fix the capacity gaps?
The UNDP has a terrific system called surge. The idea of surge is that we bring in mentors that are placed in the governors’ offices, that are placed in the GOSS. And with the African Union we hope to bring in mentors that are going to be placed at the county and payam level. A program under the UNFPA has brought in 100 midwives from Uganda. One of the biggest gaps has been midwives.
When I came in here two years ago there were 10 midwives in the whole of southern Sudan, which has one of the highest mortality rates in the world.
They support and train midwives here. You also have the IGAD iniative where 200 mid to senior civil counties from the three sister IGAD countries are embedded in government ministries and support expansion of that ministry’s work. The first 45 arrived two weeks ago from Kenya. Each of the 45 has a counterpart they would mentor for the next several years. The African Union has a program to bring in hundreds of mentors to mentor people in health and education and water.
Q. Any special word to the people of south Sudan?
Congratulations on the long walk to freedom. Thank you for allowing the international community to have been part of this walk. Three, it’s the beginning of a new nation and a new partnership.
