Page 73 - EVOLUTION OF THE SUDAN PEOPLE’S LIBERATION MOVEMENT(SPLM),

increased to 4.3 million or half of the southern population. There was no attraction of foreign
direct investment due to political instability, poor work ethics and corruption. There was slight
improvement in education enrolment to 1127963 in 2007 to 1380580 in 2009. Girl’s enrolment

increased to 30% from 27% in 2007. The report concludes that by 2010, the pace of development,
infrastructure construction and service delivery was not sufficient to meet the expectations of the
populace or the MDGs.

In their own admission at second national convention in 2008, Chairman Salva Kiir Mayardit
lamented that SPLM had not realized the aspirations of the people because peace was meaningless

without providing the people with basic needs such as shelter, health care, water, education
and decent livelihood, affirming that movement had failed in this regard. This admission and
observation by General Salva Kiir, is in tandem with the general failures associated with liberation
movements in Africa while in power. Critics of the liberation movements once in power have
observed that the movements lack courage to implement popular programs that could result

in the betterment of the lives of their people. Furthermore, critics point out that whereas they
admire their historical achievements of national liberation, they achieve very little in changing
the people’s lives on whose behalf they waged the armed struggle for national liberation. The

national liberation movements fail to challenge the basic tenets of capitalism thereby perpetuating
a pattern of dependency. Indeed, since the establishment of government of South Sudan in 2005
and declaration of independence, there has never been a clear and well defined economic policy
to address job creation, inflation, micro and macro-economic stability, inflation and exchange
rates among other economic fundamentals.

These have been exacerbated by official graft and decline in commodity prices especially oil.
Civil war and particularly the frequency and intensity of the war since 2011 have raised questions
about the nature of the armed struggle and it’s meaning in South Sudan (Joak, W, 2016). In drawing
parallels with the Africa National Congress in South Africa, Terry Blanche also makes similar
observations that despite the formal end of apartheid rule, there was continued white dominance

and the ANC led government had failed to transform the lives of black majority. On the contrary,
the ANC adopted neoliberal economic policies of Growth, Equity and Redistribution program
instead of the Reconstruction and Development Program (RDP) that formed the political basis of

social contract in 1994 elections. (Terblanche, 2005)
The political elite became rent seekers at the expense of social development suggesting betrayal

of the national democratic revolution and liberation in South Africa. In 1986, the National
Resistance Movement of Uganda captured state power after five years of waging guerilla warfare.
The NRM fought a just war to restore democratic rights and dignity of the people of Uganda

historically eroded. After the war, there was no fundamental social and economic transformation.
On the contrary, the NRM was rent seeking regime defined by kleptocracy and neopatrimonialism
tendencies. In fact, it is the military that has the last word as far as management of public affairs
is concerned.

Peter Nyaba (2007) in his work South Sudan civil war and a fledging peace observes that, SPLM
lacked clear political ideology to define the orientation of the movement and the that the SPLM

as a colonial army as opposed to a revolutionary guerilla army especially considering how it
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