South Sudan lawmakers on Thursday stormed out of a budget presentation for the financial year 2019-2020 by the finance minister to register their displeasure over the state of affairs in the country, over non-payment of salaries of civil servants and soldiers. The lawmakers reportedly staged the walk-out while the minister of finance was presenting the budget.
“Our army is cutting down trees to make a living, our foreign missions – it is now almost one year we are unable to pay them,” one of the protesting lawmakers shouted, reported Business Day. “Our teachers are not being paid. What are we doing? We are now presenting a new budget while our salaries are not being paid.”
Parliament Speaker Anthony Lino decided to adjourn the parliament sitting.
“The concerns that you have raised, I have heard them but I don’t like the way you make them,” he said. “We are going to adjourn and call the house at a time we are going to announce.”
The disruption highlights the South Sudan government’s fragility, months after the latest peace deal was signed to end a civil war often fought along ethnic lines. The conflict has killed 400,000 people, forced millions to flee their homes and crippled production of oil in the country.
South Sudan gained independence from Sudan just eight years ago in 2011. Unfortunately, in less than three years time, the troops loyal to President Salva Kiir and his former deputy turned rival Riek Machar launched a fight against each other. The peace agreement signed in September, the latest in a series reached since the conflict began in late 2013, is largely holding.
In May this year, South Sudan’s ruling and opposition parties agreed to give themselves six more months to form a unity government as part of the peace deal. The president has suggested it could take a year.
