Improving life in war-torn South Sudan

More than 200 students graduated on Thursday, April 7, 2016 in Lasu Payam, Yei River County, completing a course on how to improve livelihood of communities and secure food.

The graduates were mostly women, an unusual feat in a country with one of the world’s worst record’s on female literacy. They were trained by Women for Women in subjects including health, agriculture, savings, business, gender based violence and leadership. The one-year training programme was funded by the World Food Programme (WFP) via the international organisation, Women for Women.

In South Sudan a political power struggle descended into violence just two years after independence, spelling a return to decades of bitter civil war. Tens of thousands have been killed since clashes started in December 2013, meanwhile over 2.4 million people have fled their homes, either as internally displaced or seeking refuge in neighbouring countries.

Women for Women, sees improving the livelihoods of South Sudan citizens living in relatively peaceful areas as a key priority. Business woman Adili Monica, from Mitika, is among those who have benefited from the course, and now she has knowledge and skills on income generation activities, business management and savings.

“As a business women, how do you get money? How do you run your business? How do you attract your customers? It has helped us a lot,” she said. “Now we know how to save money […], if you can buy and animal and keep it for some months, when it grows big, you can sell it.”

“Now we can choose how to feed our families. At least it has saved our children from feeling sick all the times,” she said, adding it has cut medication expenses.

Some men told The Niles that the training challenged negative taboos on property inheritance for women and their exclusion from decision making at family and community levels.

“I learnt things I did not know before – one is the wealth sharing, which I did not know, and about hygiene. Now me and my wife, we are together, we know how to keep the fingers of our children clean,” said David Khemis, one of 53 men who graduated.

Encouraged by the training, he supported his wife who has cultivated a garden of tomatoes (10 by 15 meters), which provides for the family and provides income as she sells some of the produce at the market.

During the graduation ceremony, students presented onions, tomatoes, cabbage and bread, the fruits of the knowledge and skills they gained. “We have been taught how to get money […], now we know how to find money and not to spend all, but save some,” said Peresi Tumalu Michael.

The beneficiaries of the course, will be entitled to more training on business, agriculture and farming tools and seeds.

According to Tukube Joseph, Women for women social development trainer, both women and men were given knowledge on leadership participation and gender based violence, enabling them to boost community awareness towards ending sexual, gender and domestic violence.

A piece of land has been identified for women and men to farm together and they will be provided free seeds, Tukube said. This will prompt them to form a cooperative society, he said, stressing that the government will need to give enough land to enable them produce adequate local food against a backdrop of food shortages.

Nadia Roseline, chairperson of the Yei River County Women Association says insecurity makes women frightened of growing food in their lands. She complained that female representation in politics remained low, citing illiteracy as one of the factors contributing to low consideration and involvement at the political level to achieve the 25 percent affirmative action at all levels of government.

“We have to be in the government and help the government. Women always say politics is for the government. But this is the time to work for our country […]. We pray that peace comes, but let us not give up digging our lands just listening to information which is not true,” said Nadia.

Senior Programme Associate for the World Food Programme, Rinah Dudu, said: “WFP believes that women lie at the centre of food security,” arguing that they need more support initiatives. She added that WFP would continue to fund the Women for Women organisation, to enable further trainings.

Samuel Henry Malimbo, commissioner of Yei River County, recommended that local people should be trained as Trainers Of Trainees (TOTs), which would boost the sustainability of the project and slash transportation costs.

Women for Women International have been training hundreds of women and men in different parts of Yei River County and the municipality. Recently, it had graduations of over 600 women in Yei municipality. The organisation has expanded its services to Lasu and Mugwo in Yei municipality and also to Morobo County.

Meanwhile, Agnes Comfort, Country Director of Women for Women International, said Village Savings Loan Associations will train more people about saving, offering them training and free seeds at the start of rainy season.

The organisation will keep collaborating with the government. The aim is to produce more food locally and shrink the current dependency on expensive foreign food imports from neighbouring countries, especially Uganda.

“Most of our resources here are going to the neighbouring countries. We need to cultivate and produce our food locally,” she said, adding that the quality of home-grown food was higher. “They use chemicals, but here we are going to have organic food.”

The Minister of Education, Gender, Child and Social Development in South Sudan’s newly created Yei River State, Mary Apayi Ayiga, congratulated the organisation and other development partners for transforming lives of South Sudanese and warned men not to keep their wives away from such training courses.