A strong partnership with the UN Mission in South Sudan is needed to reinvigorate what’s been described as “green stability” in Gbudwe State in the south west of the country, according to a senior state minster.

“This part of South Sudan has always produced food for the rest of the country,” says Pia Philip Michael, the Minister of Education, Gender, Children and Social Welfare. “Before the war this area was stable and self-sustaining, but when the fighting started we lost our green stability.”

Some 85 per cent of the people of Gbudwe State in the Western Equatoria region are farmers who have had to flee their farms and stop agricultural production in the wake of recent violence.

While the state was once distanced from the conflict that has devastated the fledgling nation, the emergence of numerous militias fighting for both the government SPLA and the opposition or IO forces over the past 18 months has led to documented atrocities and renewed civilian displacement.

In early January, around 1,350 people took flight from Bazimburu and surrounding villages some 12 miles from the state capital Yambio, because, according to one of those who fled, James Pour, “civilians were being shot at.” He is now sheltering at an informal and impromptu settlement at a women’s training centre in Yambio town.

As a farmer, he is keen to return to his land ahead of the planting season in April and May, but he says that he and fellow villagers could only return home when there was peace “otherwise we will have to run like we did before.”

Host families

The 1,350 people at the women’s training centre are unique in Yambio, to the extent that they are living in a camp, albeit a temporary one. The more than 120,000 internally displaced persons who are currently finding refuge in Yambio are living with host families.

“We have not wanted our people to live in PoC sites here. We have looked after these people in our own homes but now there is an element of fatigue in the community and we need some outside assistance”, says Minister Pia Philip Michael.

The culture of self-sufficiency which has served the region so well in the past has now been pushed to its limits.

Talking to the head of the UN peacekeeping mission in South Sudan (UNMISS), David Shearer, who was making his first trip to Yambio, Minister Pia Philip Michael urged the UN to “help us to help ourselves.”

The UNMISS military contingent in Yambio is comprised of just around 170 troops, mainly from Rwanda, who mount patrols across Gbudwe and the neighbouring states Tambura and Maridi to provide humanitarian access and build confidence among local people.

 “I hope that farmers will return to their land, when they feel secure enough to do so. In the meantime, I am overjoyed to hear that people in this part of South Sudan want to help themselves to become self-sufficient and not depend on aid”, said Mr. Shearer.

“The key word is partnership,” he added, “and UNMISS is keen to play a role in helping people move on from conflict,” underscoring that peace is a pre-requisite for development.