Page 85 - EVOLUTION OF THE SUDAN PEOPLE’S LIBERATION MOVEMENT(SPLM),

and make popular sacrifices in the interest of the nation and the newly found freedom (Ntalaja,
1984; MacCulloh, 1983). The power struggle between Riek Machar and President Salva Kiir
suggests that the movement did not have shared ideas, ideals and shared future aspirations.

Evidently, their differences have polarized the movement and factionalized the elite to the point
of rupture and civil war on many occasions. In support of this narrative, one respondent stated that;

“We looked on as the two struggle to be at the helm of SPLM.Their differences brought about
disunity in the movement, Mistrust and this also percolated down to the citizens who were

looking up to them. Peace dividend promised was not seen and power struggle continued taking
Centre stage. There was no unity among our leaders and this almost took us back to where we
had been years back.” (O1, Bentiu, 19/11/2016).

What is more, the government failed to provide security to the civilians, transform the SPLM into
disciplinary army, revamp the economy but most importantly failed to find common set of shared
values among different ethnic groups in South Sudan. Building a new nation of South Sudan has
become a challenge that the SPLM cannot address and historically eluded the movement from
the initial stages of nation building through the period the movement waged wars of national

liberation struggle since 1983. The political culture build over time and has persisted assumes
militarization of power and politics that only increases instability and war lordism. The result has
been a cycle of wars and political crises that increases every time there are diplomatic attempts at

a political settlement. The past attempts to resolve the political crises in South Sudan reproduce
similar outcomes followed by far more serious crises than the previous ones. The SPLM strategy
appears aimed at keeping power through disorder and militarization of politics (Peter Biar Ajak,
2016).The persistence conflicts and power struggle between president Salva Kiir on the one hand
Riek Machar on the other hand has reignited the conflicts and taken the historical pattern since

the formation of the SPLM/M in 1983. As a result of the conflict, thousands of civilians have been
internally displaced while others have been killed, maimed or forced to flee into the neighboring
countries as refugees. Meanwhile, government officials have stolen millions of dollars. What

is more 70% of women seeking shelter in the United Nations camps have been raped by state
security agencies with many more facing starvations. The magnitude of the crises has raised
new possibilities including the option of a trusteeship along the lines of Kosovo, East Timor and
Bosnia. The second thesis associated with Mahmoud Mamdani, a Ugandan academic proposes a
transitional government of South Sudan with a six-year mandate composed of technocrats and

academics.

The sustained civil war in South Sudan and the inability or failure by the SPLM to resolve it since
2013 suggests that the echo effect thesis associated with national liberation movements in Africa
has been vindicated. The view that a liberation movement becomes part of the problem once in

power has been a sustained theme and thesis in African politics. We have noted how the African
National Congress, the latest liberation movement to form a government in South Africa failed
to resolve the national and social question years after the formal disintegration of apartheid rule

in South Africa in 1994. The land question, widespread poverty, corruption and wrong economic
policies have reversed the liberation narrative. The majority of the people expected or had hoped
for a developmental state that would shield them from the vagrancies of neoliberal globalization
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