Juba City is no longer what it was a decade ago. Once a small town, it has transformed into a bustling metropolitan hub. Thousands of South Sudanese are flocking to the capital daily, some running from trouble, others chasing a better chance to work or raise their kids. But there is a dark side to all this growth. Land grabbing has become normal and is tearing the city apart.
These days, trying to get a piece of land in Juba feels less like a legal process and more like a gamble. Playgrounds that no one should be selling get divided and sold. Fake allocations happen in broad daylight. The law is on the books, but on the ground, the powerful do as they please, and ordinary people pay the price.
We young people are the backbone of this country. We make up most of the population, and for us, land is not a luxury; it is how we build a life. With jobs so hard to come by, owning a small plot means you can start a plan, put up a shack for a shop, or just have somewhere to call home. It’s dignity. It is a future.
But right now, we feel locked out. While we watch from the roadside, well-connected folks, some of them foreigners, some locals with money, grab every empty marsh and hillside. We are not asking for charity. We want a real seat where decisions are made. We want to buy land the right way and sleep without fear of someone chasing us off in a rental place.
Why does this chaos keep going? Because the people in charge and the traditional landowners don’t talk properly. The Bari community is the original owner of the land Juba sits on. They have their own customs and rules about how land passes from one person or family to another. But then you have the modern laws from Juba County, Central Equatoria State, and the South Sudan Transitional Constitution 2011 as Amended. The three systems do not match, and land grabbers slip right through the gap.
The result is a mess. You hear stories all the time, a piece of land sold to three different buyers. A young man pays for a plot with his savings, only to discover later that it is actually someone’s land. Nobody checks. Nobody takes responsibility.
So what do we do? More threats will not fix this. We need a real conversation, a structured one. The government has to accept that Juba will not stop growing. But growth without rules is just destruction.
That is why we are asking for an Emergency Urban Land Summit as soon as possible. Bring together the local authorities from Central Equatoria State, because they hold the legal keys. Bring in Juba County officials to mark clearly which land is for public use, which is for business, and which is for homes. And most importantly, bring the Bari elders who are the true custodians, so their knowledge of clan boundaries and their traditional consent become part of the official record.
To the leaders of Central Equatoria State and Juba County: sit down with the Bari elders. Pull out a real map of Juba. Look at how the city is pushing outward toward Rajaf, Kator, and the outer suburbs. Decide together who owns what. Then set up a transparent system that is not too expensive to allow young South Sudanese, including those who grew up in Juba but are not Bari, to buy land legally.
If nothing changes, the grabbing will not stop. And if the grabbing does not stop, our generation will lose hope. And a young person without hope is dangerous, not because they are bad, but because they have got nothing left to lose. We do not want to take land by force. We want to pay for it. We want it registered. We want a city that is fair, organized, and worth building.
Juba is growing. The only question is: will you guide that growth, or will you let the thieves run the show? The decision is yours. Our future is right here under our feet.
The writer is a South Sudanese Journalist. He can be reached at khamislokudu@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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