By Bida Elly David
A vocal legislator at the transitional national legislative assembly has revealed that continuous delays of civil servants’ salaries by the government had been happening due to the fact that the parliament has been muted and compromised making it difficult to stand for the citizens.
In a statement seen by No.1 Citizen Daily newspaper yesterday, Juol Nhomngek an opposition lawmaker at the R-TNLA said that parliamentarians have been silenced from deliberating on remuneration of civil servants saying that the parliament has totally failed through the leadership of in-active speaker.
He said that the role of the parliament to stand for the rights of the civil servants and the national army has been rubbished and transformed into parliamentary benefits adding that the continuous delays of the salaries has been the order of the day because the leadership of the parliament is detaining it from being passed into law.
Juol further revealed that numerous complaints have been made by concerned parliamentarians through the social media and sittings but nothing seemed to have materialized.
“The failure is due to the fact that the Parliament is compromised as the head is not there to serve the citizens but she is there to promote herself at the expense of the people of South Sudan,” he alleged saying “Despite our numerous complaints on social media and during the sittings of the Parliament on this matter, nothing is forthcoming.”
He further termed the parliament to be a corrupt entity of a highest order where individuals within the leadership work for their own benefits but not for the public interest.
“It is sad to see that Party that holds itself out to be pro-people appointed the Rt. Hon Speaker purposely to destroy the Parliament” he claimed adding that “at the present, the Parliament is not acting like the real Parliament in the real sense but it has been turned into a house where individuals among the leaders are just enriching themselves with limited public resources.”
Juol stressed Corruption is part of the daily life at the national assembly as it has reached to the extent of taking money at night, which is not normal.
He accused some parliamentarians for having joined the legislative management on corrupt initiatives instead of pushing for national interest, pointing that the parliament has rotten as some parliamentarians have become spies and corrupt.
“Hence, the Parliament is now there only for physical outlook but it is internally rotten to the core. We have been staging several campaigns against corruption and other mismanagements in the Parliament but nothing has changed and instead things keep on worsening,” he said.
MP Juol further stated that the speaker has resorted into techniques that have dismantled the Parliament and reduced it into an institution run at the whim of individual like herself.
“All millions of pounds and dollars that were supposed to be approved by the Parliament, she is the only one approving them hence allocating them according to her priorities. The clear example was the recent millions of dollars that were intended for the games but they never benefitted the Participants as the Rt. Hon Speaker and the group only know where the money is currently,” he said
He accused the speaker for having personally approved money to aid the national parliamentarians during the games and sports competition revealing that players went through injuries and not treated.
“It was so sad to see the players that were injured during the games could not be treated because there was no money nor did the Parliament hire ambulances to transport the injured players,” he cited,