WILLIAM SAMOEI RUTO, Ph.D.
President of the Republic of Kenya & Chairperson of Tumaini initiative,
Thro’ Dr. Abraham Sing’oei Korir, PS, Ministry of Foreign and Diaspora Affairs, 6th June, 2024,
PETITION TO CHANGE THE NAME ‘‘TUMAINI INITIATIVE’’
We wish to reiterate our profound gratitude to you and the Kenyan people at large for accepting to host and Chair the South Sudan Peace talks that was previously mediated by the Sant’egidio Catholic community in Rome, Italy.
We are always happy that our African people and the International community are not yet tired of helping us to resolves our recurring conflicts and problems emanating from our clamor for state and nation building. We are closely monitoring the peace negotiation, and we hope the parties will reached a compromise without compromising on the root causes of the war in South Sudan.
On 9th May 2024, during the launch of the High Level Mediation for South Sudan, you named or christened the peace talks as ‘‘Tumaini initiative.’’
Since then, many of our people to whom this peace negotiation is dedicated have been calling consistently, to know and understand the meaning of word ‘Tumaini’. As you are fondly aware, South Sudan is not a Kiswahili Speaking Nation; and that is the reason why the language being used in the mediation is English alone. We therefore demand that you change the word ‘tumaini’ so as to avoid any slightest feeling of confusion that may hinder the peace implementation process eventually.
In South Sudan, there are many idle Peace Agreements which are not being implemented partly because of the mistakes of the previous peace mediators.
For instance, in the capital Juba, you will find some dormant Peace Accords which are signed and written in Arabic that is neither an official nor a national language recognized in our Interim transitional constitution, 2011.
We presumed that South Sudanese are the legitimate owners of this peace negotiation notwithstanding the place on which it is housed or hosted. The fact that the mediation is now taking place in Nairobi is not a sufficient reason to name it in a language that is not privy to us as a country. We think the salient reason for calling the peace talks as Tumaini initiative could be that you want to give this mediation a mark to show that it was done on Kenyan soil.
However, in our view the credit that we would like to accords you and the Kenyan at large is to make sure that the agreement which is going to come out from this negotiation is implemented to the letter and spirit.
Finally, the demand to remove the word Tumaini is done pursuant to our legal right of information provided for in our domestic and international laws.
DAK BUOTH RIEK-GAAK
Chairman, South Sudan Civil Society Consortium
COPIED TO:
- Albino Mathem, Head of South Sudan Government’s Delegation
- Commander Stephen Buay RolNyang, Chairman, SSPM/SUNNA
- Pagan Amum, Chairman, Real SPLM
- Civil Society Delegates
- Local and International Media