A group of energetic and dynamic youth is demanding an end to bloodshed in 2017. 

The youth advocacy group Ana Taban has launched a campaign dubbed #Bloodshedfree2017, calling on the country’s leaders to stop the fighting and suffering.

The campaign was launched with an open-mic event in Juba, featuring youth using their talents in singing, poetry, music and drama to demand peace and express messages of fatigue with war. 

“We are campaigning for an honest and genuine ceasefire. We want to see all stakeholders involved, especially youth,” Ayak Chjol Deng, a member of the Ana Taban group, told Radio Miraya.

Ayak says they are demanding more regional and international pressure to ensure the peace holds. She thinks that the youth campaign comes timely after the African Union leaders at their recent summit declared 2017 the year of the youth, under the catchy theme “Harnessing the Demographic Dividend through Investment in Youth.”

Manasseh Mathing, an Ana Taban activist, says that ordinary South Sudanese should ‘take ownership’ of their country and realize that they have a role to play in demanding peace.

Ana Taban is a literal translation from Arabic and means ‘I am tired;’ a direct reference to the fatigue with war.