South Sudan's English Daily Newspaper
"We Dare where others fear"
By Awan Achiek
The Ngok Dinka of Abyei Administrative Area and Twic Mayardit of Warrap State have traded accusations over the violence that left over 14 people dead and 6 wounded in Malual-Aleu village in Alel County.
The incident occurred on 26th December at around 6:00 A.M in Malual Aleu village.
Simon Aguek Chan Atem, the Commissioner of Twic County accused armed youth from the Abyei Administrative Area of attacking the village.
“They were the ones who attacked before yesterday on 26th December. They came in a huge number from Abyei and they involved soldiers from division four in Unity State,” said Chan during an interview with The Dawn on Thursday.
He alleged that the attack took place on Tuesday and Wednesday, adding that armed youth from Abyei were still mobilizing to launch another attack on Malual Aleu village.
Chan said some of the dead have not yet been buried by press time.
For his part, Bolis Kuoch, the Minister of Information for Abyei Administrative Area claimed that armed youth from Twic launched two separate attacks in Northern Abyei and Malual-Aleu on the 21st and 26th of December.
Kouch said armed youth from Twic raided 465 heads of cattle on 21st December in Northern Abyei.
“There were two attacks, the first incident happened on 21st December in which armed youth from Warrap backed up by solider of Gai Maciek attacked North of Abyei but there were no people there because since fighting started between Abyei and Misseriya there were no people there,” he said.
Kouch disclosed that Tuesday’s attack in Malual-Aleu village left 6 people wounded from their side.
“On 26th December, they also attacked us in Malual-Aleu of Alel County. They attacked the place at 6:00 A.M and it continued up to 2 P.M leaving 6 wounded, and one among them is seriously injured and he is undergoing operation and the 5 are recovering well. Nobody died from our side, we only have six injured and this is what happened on 21 December,” he said.
In February 2022, fighting erupted at Aneet Market in the Abyei Administrative Area over ownership of the land by two communities.
Since then, armed youth from the two communities have launched offensive attacks against each other.
President Salva Kiir in the aftermath of the violence formed an ad-hoc committee to investigate the killings in the Aneet market.
The Ad-hoc committee headed by Vice President for Service Cluster, Hussein Abdelbagi arrested four people including a state minister believed to have incited the renewed fighting have been arrested.
On May 5th, leaders from the two communities reached an agreement to cease hostilities but later on, fighting erupted again with both sides trading blame.
