Even a man with the thickest skull is aware of this fact. Salva Kiir Mayardit is already president. You don’t hand power over to a man who already has it. Without elections, he has nothing to lose, but he knows the truth: he knows who gave him the mandate, and he knows citizens are tired of endless extensions of the agreement and continued deprivation of their basic rights and development. Therefore, his call for elections is an honor to the laws of the land and the citizens. He does not assume a win. Perhaps a different contestant can win, but he needs citizens to decide. In essence, he is returning power to the people, restoring it to its rightful owners: the citizens.
The man with nothing to gain from elections is demanding the vote. The men who stand to lose everything are delaying it. Why the irony? The opposition, who call themselves peace partners, think that peace rewards them more than elections would.
Their song is “Conditions Are Not Ideal.” “Prerequisites Have Not Been Met.” Who made them that way? The same men and women crying insecurity are the ones holding the guns. That is not an analysis. It is a fact. A true hostage advertisement hung high on the billboard.
I can even call it by its true name: they create the crisis, blame the president for it, and then demand more time to fix what they broke. They are pleased with this game. Break it. Blame him. Buy more time.
Those anchoring the postponement of the national elections in Dr. Riek Machar’s trial should understand this: “Peace partner” is not a synonym for “immunity.” An army battalion was killed in Nasir. That is not a metaphor. It is not a political disagreement. Soldiers assigned to protect the country from an enemy that may come through the Sobat River or the Ethiopian border are all dead. Wiped out by forces under his command. If evidence ties a man to that, the only real question is why he would ever be treated differently.
A sane person would agree outright that twelve million citizens do not owe their future to one man’s comfort. A country is not a hostage negotiation where the “price of peace” is silence about a massacre. That is not a peace deal. That is a license for one to kill and keep his seat.
The highly acclaimed dialogue is not perfect. Look at who sits at the table: the same elites, comfortable in the same offices, deciding the fate of citizens who have never been asked a single question about their future. Do you think of a scenario like that as peacebuilding? Rightly, it is a landlord’s meeting, deciding the tenants’ future without inviting them.
A man facing accountability for Nasir’s massacre has every reason to want the country perpetually unready for elections. Perpetual transition in this manner is no longer an accident. It is a bunker built to outlast the case against him.
President Salva Kiir Mayardit is the real victim here. He is the one fighting rebellious comrades he trusted with authority and public resources. They did not do the job. They stole the resources. And when removed and questioned, they underwent a metamorphosis, becoming suspects today and opposition tomorrow. In this context, persecution serves as the final refuge for those who have been caught.
This article, any press release, or even a powerful foreign press statement won’t decide what happened in Nasir. That inexcusable incident belongs to a courtroom to resolve, not a communiqué. A judiciary bends for no one: neither for a defendant too inconvenient to prosecute nor for a defendant too convenient to protect.
Judges in the United States have struck down policies from their president. No one referred to that as hostage-taking or a strategy to exclude an opponent from the electoral contest. They called it a judiciary doing its job in accordance with the Constitution. South Sudan deserves the same principle to be applied without a double standard: a court decides on matters of the Nasir massacre, not a foreign capital.
We are closely observing the pressure that arrives disguised as concern. We are aware that foreign capitals only recall “judicial independence” when the verdict contradicts their preferred man. Judicial independence that bends to command is not independence.
We must always remember this fact. South Sudanese chose Kiir in 2010. He was not elected by the IGAD, the AU, or the Troika. He was not handpicked by Dr. Riek Machar and his supporters. Removing him by force implies a different case, perhaps a complicated one, whereas applying democratic methods for his removal is much easier, with one clear avenue for such complaints: the ballot box on December 22, 2026.
We all know that elections choose a government. Give the process a chance. However, let our courts answer for the Nasir massacre. Confusing the two is precisely how the guilty hide behind the peace they claim to protect.
The date for elections is set. December 22, 2026. Let the people decide who was ever serious about peace.
Till then, yours truly, Mr. Teetotaler!
The writer, Dr. Sunday de John, holds an MBA and a Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBChB) from the University of Nairobi, Faculty of Business and Management Sciences and Faculty of Medicine, respectively. He is the current Chairman of the South Sudan United Front-Progressive and can be reached via drsundayalong4@gmail.com
The views expressed in ‘opinion’ articles published by Radio Tamazuj are solely those of the writer. The veracity of any claims made is the responsibility of the author, not Radio Tamazuj.
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