The Azande Kingdom traditionally included both parts of Western Equatoria and Azande groups now resident in the CAR and DRC. The last Azande monarch was King Gbudwe, who in the 19th century led resistance against encroaching slave traders, before his capture and death in 1905 at the hands of British colonialists.[14] While Gbudwe was revered among the Azande for his military prowess, this very talent inspired fear in surrounding communities—fears that would subsequently resurface in the 21st century. After Gbudwe’s death, the kingdom remained without a king for over a century, despite intermittent attempts to restore the monarchy.
All that changed on 9 February 2022, when the paramount chief of Yambio county, Atoroba Peni Rikito, was crowned the new Azande king, albeit one whose kingdom would be restricted to South Sudan. It is politics in Juba that explicates the king’s coronation. Following Futuyo’s ascension to the governorship in 2020, Azande faith in the SPLM was failing, and Kiir calculated that by granting the re-establishment of the kingdom, he would keep them within his political coalition.
Peni’s coronation came after a great deal of lobbying. Most recently, the Azande Supreme Welfare Organization had been pushing Kiir to re-establish the kingdom. Complicating these efforts was a disagreement over who the king should be.[15] Peni was the popular choice and claimed the most legitimate hereditary right to the title. Jemma Nunu (Gbudwe’s grand-daughter) thought he was a threat, however, and instead proposed the paramount chief of Tambura county as the Azande king. After this suggestion was blocked, Jemma Nunu put forward Paulino Zizzi as a compromise candidate.[16] Kiir, however, was always going to pick Peni, who had long been a popular leader among the Azande. To have appointed an unpopular king would have ruined Kiir’s political strategy. Furthermore, after a period of critique of the SPLM—which resulted in Peni’s imprisonment in Juba in 2016—Peni had come to an accommodation with Kiir’s regime.
Despite Peni’s popularity, much remains uncertain about the fate of the Azande Kingdom. South Sudan’s other great monarchy, the Shilluk, has seen their king politically captured by the SPLM (Craze, 2022). It is not clear what it means for a monarchy that once had spiritual and military sovereignty over its territory to exist within the context of a nation state in which, at least in theory, Kiir’s regime exercises a monopoly on violence and the use of political power. Tensions have already emerged. Peni intended to appoint ambassadors from the Azande communities in the CAR and DRC, only to be told by Jemma Nunu that only the government in Juba can make such appointments.
Meanwhile, the re-establishment of the kingdom has been a political lightning rod. Jemma Nunu and Patrick Zamoi fear a loss of influence. In 2022, this was exacerbated by Peni’s decision on Gbudwe Day (which celebrates the former king), to visit Kiir directly at J1 (State House) in Juba, bypassing Jemma Nunu, who has long positioned herself as the Azande power broker.[17] Peni’s decision in September 2023 to relocate the royal palace to Bazunga payam, Yambio county, further underlines the way the establishment of the kingdom has shifted power away from the Tambura elite.[18]
The re-established kingdom has also kindled fears of Azande dominance among other ethnic groups in Western Equatoria. Futuyo has accused Jemma Nunu—entirely without basis—of wishing to create a pan-national Azande kingdom, including the Azande populations of the CAR and DRC. Futuyo’s allegations must have been bitterly received, because the establishment of the kingdom has lessened, not augmented, Jemma Nunu’s power.
Much about Peni’s nascent kingdom has yet to be determined. In August 2023, Peni went on a fundraising drive in the United States among the Azande diaspora in order to obtain funds for the kingdom’s administration. Customarily, the kingdom was decentralized, with positions such as paramount chiefs determined from the ground up, via a process of popular sovereignty. Peni’s confirmation of Simon Atoroba as the paramount chief of Yambio county has been controversial, partly because it upsets this tradition of popular sovereignty, and has led many chiefs not to recognize Atoroba. ‘The kingship’, one customary chief said, ‘should not be a dictatorship’.[19] In order to keep a lid on budding Azande nationalism, however, there is pressure from Juba to turn the kingship into exactly that, especially given the international dimensions of the affair.
[14] For a more detailed history of the Azande Kingdom, see Waanzi (forthcoming).
[15] Author interview with Azande elders, Yambio, August 2023.
[16] Paulino Zizzi, who comes from a disgraced lineage of the royal family, is thought of as cursed; this malediction extends to his son, Richard Zizzi, who was the SPLM-IO commissioner of Nzara county before trying to unseat Futuyo as governor, leading to his dismissal and effective house arrest in Juba.
[17] Gbudwe Day was held on 4 February 2022.
[18] The payam is South Sudan’s third administrative level, under state and county; payams are divided up into bomas.
[19] Author interview with customary chief, name withheld, Yambio, August 2023.
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