South Sudanese are urged to be proactive and insist on accountability as the budget is discussed by MPs.

As the South Sudan budget has been submitted in parliaments, people are asked to be skeptical of government officials and to use all means possible to ask their assigned representatives in government where the money of South Sudan is.

Section 15 (3) of the Transitional Constitution of South Sudan, 2011 as modified, and the Public Financial Management Act of 2011, provide that national income and expenditures must be budgeted and made public.

As a result, every person has the right to demand accountability for how the executive has spent South Sudan’s national resources.

Don’t let the Executive trick you into thinking there is no money in the nation. Know that while government workers are languishing in the mire of economic misery, people are getting paid 100,000,000 in the Ministry of Finance and Planning for contract debts that the nation and citizens have no understanding of how they were handled.

So, if the Executive tells you that there is no money, don’t trust them since mismanagement of resources might result in a shortage of resources. 

In fact, South Sudan has more resources than Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda combined. South Sudan, for example, produces over 170,000 barrels of oil per day, and after clearing Sudan and international firms operating in oil fields, it retains certain barrels that it sells for more than $10,000,000 USD each day. If you compute for one month, South Sudan might get $300,000,000.

South Sudan earns more than 5 billion SSP and 10,000,000 USD each month from non-oil earnings, as has been consistently reported since 2017.

Nilepet, the Public Cooperation, gets 8% of all oil businesses working in the oilfields. This amounts to millions of dollars in cash that are unaccounted for.

Citizens want answers from the Minister of Finance and Planning, the Minister of Petroleum, and the Director of Nilepet as to how Nilepet is administered and why Nilepet revenue is not transferred into the National Treasury Account.

South Sudan obtains millions of dollars from resource sectors such as gold and other valuable minerals, which flow directly into people’s purses. South Sudan gets millions of dollars in loans from the IMF and other nations such as China, the United States, and the European Union. The government is now in debt to these countries in the billions of dollars.

This suggests that if the government manages the country’s resources effectively, we can improve compensation for all government employees while still having enough to invest in the country’s growth.

To summarize, the people should closely monitor budget implementation, even after it has been presented, and confront their representatives about why they do not fight for citizens’ rights.

South Sudan has adequate money, and if people are not paid and growth is not taking place, it is apparent that the failure is due to misuse of our resources, not a lack of money in the nation.

Mismanagement is not the same as a lack of resources.