Louis Lobong Lojore has been the governor of Eastern Equatoria since 2010. He has entrenched his control of the state by building an elite coalition across ethnic lines and disbursing revenues related to the state’s gold-mining sector. Yet, Lobong’s reign in Eastern Equatoria is built on shaky foundations.
Tong Akeen Ngor, the governor of Northern Bahr el Ghazal state, South Sudan, has consolidated his grip on power by buying support, detaining members of the opposition, and ingratiating himself with South Sudanese President Salva Kiir. Tong Akeen, however, lacks popularity. The state has traditionally been an SPLM stronghold, and he is seen as an NCP interloper from the north.
Warrap is the birthplace of President Salva Kiir and the seat of his power. The state is home to many of the leading generals and politicians in his coalition, including—most notably—Akol Koor Kuc. Akol Koor controls Warrap state, and Governor Manhiem Bol Malek wields power by remaining in Koor’s good graces. Manhiem has used many of his predecessor’s methods and, like his predecessor, he has not been successful in quelling dissent and intercommunal clashes.
Since 2021, politics in Western Equatoria has become increasingly ethnicized, with heightening tension between the Azande and Balanda. The situation has been inflamed by the political strife between Jemma Nunu Kumba, the speaker of South Sudan’s Transitional National Legislative Assembly, and the opposition-party governor of Western Equatoria state, Alfred Futuyo Karaba. Tensions are high as armed troops from both the government forces and SPLA-IO patrol the state capital, Yambio, and state politicians amass war chests.
Though elections are now postulated for next year, South Sudan remains in crisis. Conflict continues to scar the country, and climatic shocks exacerbate already acute resource scarcity, leaving approximately 76 per cent of South Sudan’s population surviving on humanitarian assistance. The regime of South Sudanese President Salva Kiir survives by diverting revenues in three key areas—oil production, humanitarianism, and loans from international financial institutions—to the benefit of an elite class in Juba, but at the cost of the immiseration of the people of South Sudan.
Despite many high-profile interventions, Abyei remains mired in a violent impasse. Conflict between the Ngok and Twic Dinka continues, and the territory’s political future remains in limbo.
A reshuffle of Jonglei’s state government is underway, precipitated by the out-going leadership’s inability to quell chronic armed violence and raiding in the state.. While the current rainy season will prevent large-scale raiding in the coming months, attacks on humanitarian convoys and low-level raiding continue, with women and children abducted.
Upper Nile is on the precipice of renewed armed conflict. After a lull in violence in the past two months, armed groups are mobilizing for possible confrontation as Johnson Olonyi’s Agwelek forces reposition themselves near key ports on the White Nile, and SPLA-IO and Nuer White Army forces mobilize youth in northern Jonglei and southern Upper Nile.
In Warrap state, home to South Sudanese President Salva Kiir and much of the country's political and military elite, many hoped that the signing of a peace agreement in 2018 would bring an end to the violence that had scarred their country for the previous five years. Instead, in Warrap, violence intensified, and pitted communities against each other in increasingly brutal tit-for-tat attacks that targeted women, children, homes, and the very capacities of communities to sustain life. At the war's end, everything became war.
Upper Nile is in chaos. A once durable alliance between the national government in Juba and the Padang Dinka in Malakal has given way to a much more uncertain situation, in which the regime of South Sudanese President Salva Kiir sets feuding elites against each other. Disorder has proved an effective tool of rule.