By Mary Poni
The Presbyterian Church of South Sudan has condemned the rampant incidents of killing in the Country with emphasis on the recent Mayom tragic murders and extrajudicial killings, saying the spilling of innocent blood is a curse to the nation.
The Presbyterian Church of South Sudan (PCSS) leadership which went for a pastoral mission to Unity State, Bentiu recently stressed that it upholds the biblical teaching of; “you shall not murder” Exodus (20:13) NIV.
“As a church, morally, we think what is happening is not only damaging the name of South Sudan internationally, but it is inviting curse on our land and unnecessary condemnation of the world on us”, the Presbyterian church moderator of the 34th general assembly, Rev. James Ninrew Dong said.
“With support from the international humanitarian law, international criminal law and Geneva convection hence condemn the barbaric act of the extrajudicial killings in the strongest terms possible,” he added.
The PCSS church moderator noted that having condemned the manner and the inhumane action, the executing authority has taken to deal with the suspects doesn’t mean that the church is condoning whatever the reason may be for the killing including that of Mayom County Commissioner.
The execution incident however, instilled panic to the nation especially to the people living in Unity State where the heinous killing of the Commissioner including more than eleven persons occurred.
In a statement to the media, Rev. Dong said, the Presbyterian Church learnt of the unspoken heinous act of murder after it went viral on social media despite the fact that they were in Bentiu.
He further underlined that, the due process of the law should have taken its course and the human rights and dignity of the accused victims who were brutally executed should have been handled with respect to the law.
“We pray for this nation to repent so that it is healed and cleansed from the innocent blood”, quoting from the Bible in 2nd Chronicles (7:14) NIV, “if my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land”.
“This is our stand to the public because this is inhumane act that we are introducing to our country”, he stressed.
According to Dong, the incident happened when they were in the State for a mission in Bentiu which is somehow far from Mayom County but they were not told of what happened, instead they learnt through the social media.
The Presbyterian team left Juba to Bentiu for a nation peace prayer and reconciliation and they returned to Juba this week.
“When we learnt about the incident, we went to confirm with some of the local authorities and they admitted it but they didn’t disclose what exactly the issue was”, because by then the governor was not in Bentiu town but in Mayom where the incident took place,” Rev. Dong stated.
He said, the other State Ministers who were on the ground in Bentiu, had no clue of the incident but the cleric still believed that they (officials) have more information than them because they are the government but they decided not to disclose to them.
The PCSS leader noted that they would have otherwise talked to the authorities concerned in the State and issued their press statement in Bentiu, unfortunately no authority was willing to talk to them.
Rev. Dong highlighted that there are a lot of incidents happening in the Country but the only difference was that, in Mayom, a brave South Sudanese was able to capture a video clip and posted it on social media, that is how they were able to see though nobody is questing yet many people are dying and being killed in silence.
“My appeal to the citizen is that, if something like that is happening, I think, despite what will happen whether they will take action or not, they should expose and we should also question ourselves that God created the person that nobody on earth has the authority to take the life of any person no matter the cases maybe, because the Bible stated it clearly that do not murder, which is one of the ten commandments,” the cleric emphasized.