By Philip Buda Ladu
A fragile calm settled over Juba on Friday, following a tense Thursday night, as political tensions escalated in the wake of First Vice President Riek Machar’s house arrest.
Despite the surface-level normalcy of daily life, deep-seated fear and anxiety gripped the city’s residents.
Samuel, a shopkeeper in Juba’s Konyo-Konyo market, too afraid to reveal his full name for fear of government reprisal, painted a bleak picture of the economic fallout.
“The market is unpredictable,” he lamented, “Importers are too scared to bring goods. We pray the tensions subside because if war breaks out, we’ll suffer extreme hunger. We’re vulnerable, relying entirely on imports.”
The small-scale trader’s voice trembled as he described the rising commodities prices and dwindling sales, a direct consequence of the escalating political crisis.
“If this continues, we’ll close our businesses. We’ll lose everything.” He added, with stark resignation, “In case of war, our security is not guaranteed. The risk of losing lives is very high, and businesses will be looted,” he exclaimed.
Jane, a resident of Juba’s Gudele suburb, echoed the pervasive fear of a looming political chaos as the government affirms First Vice President Riek Machar’s house arrest stating that
“It’s so unfortunate that we are about to experience this again,” Jane said, her voice heavy with dread. “We are scared, very scared right now.”
She criticized the presence of Ugandan forces, claiming it exacerbated the tension.
“The presence involvement of the Ugandan forces in South Sudan internal issues is creating more tensions, because as they are executing their mission, innocent civilians are being killed in the process, and this is creating more tensions.” She echoed.
Jane’s personal history, born in a refugee camp due to previous conflicts, amplified her fear.
“I’m a bit scared because I’ve never experienced it before, and I wouldn’t want to witness it.” She concluded with a chillingly simple statement of her deepest fear: “My greatest fear is people losing their lives, the country going back to zero.”
Jacob Mawien, from the Gumbo neighbourhood, observed a palpable shift in the city’s atmosphere.
“There are a lot of changes, as you can see,” Mawien said, his voice laced with concern. “A lot of panic being created online, that there could be war at any time, which has made many people sometime to go home early, and some report to their workplace late.”
He acknowledged the lingering trauma of past conflicts, fueling his anxiety. “I have fear that conflict may arise again.”
Abdallah Segenda, a Ugandan taxi driver who has called Juba home since 2002, spoke of the city’s drastic decline saying “Juba has drastically changed, the economy worsened, no money,” he said, his voice weary.
He expressed a primal fear of renewed violence.
“I fear if war breaks out all people will die because, during the fighting of 2016, a lot of dead bodies were rotting on the ground.”
He pleaded for dialogue, a desperate hope for peace.
“War is not good. God save the people of Juba. Let the leaders sit on the negotiating table to dialogue and solve their differences,” he appealed.