Matia Samuel
Africa-Press – South-Sudan. The First Deputy Speaker at the National Legislative Assembly, Oyet Nathaniel lamented over the meagre resources allocated for peace implementation.
The National Treasury, in the proposed 2023–24 budget, allocated SSP 50 billion for peace implementations. But Oyet says this money would be a drop in the ocean when compared to the mammoth task that lies ahead of the government.
“The peace has been lagging behind with many outstanding tasks that are very key and relevant to the conduct of free, fair, and credible elections, SSP50 billion is not enough for the peace budget,” he said during the second reading of the proposed fiscal year budget last week.
He stated that the proposal for the supplementary budget, which according to the law always comes after six months, may not prove effective.
“You haven’t included within those 12 months significant allocations for pending tasks that are in the agreement, then I will doubt the sincerity of whoever planned this budget and say the election is due in 2024,” he said
Although the budget was prepared under the theme “consolidating peace and stabilizing the economy”, Oyet says the paltry allocation of resources defeats the wider intention of having the budget.
He stated, “The peace budget of SSP 50 billion which is an equivalent of $50M, we cannot call it a budget adequate for addressing peace implementation in the republic of South Sudan.”
The national minister of finance and planning, Dier Tong Ngor proposed SSP 50 billion in the 2023–2024 fiscal year to be channeled to the ministry of peacebuilding to conduct its activities. This has been considered a priority in Chapter Two of the Revitalized Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in South Sudan (R-ARCSS)
However, the national minister of peace building, Stephen Kuol, welcomed the SSP 50 billion in June, saying it was good news that the peace implementation mechanism was allocated such an amount for peace implementations.
According to him, the implementation of peace is essential to stabilizing security and enhancing the economy.
Source: The City Review South Sudan
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