Presidential Press Secretary, Ateny Wek Ateny has finally responded to Daniella Valentino claims that he is having affair with multiple women.
Here is the Ateny respond:
I don’t know how to respond to personal insults. As part of my upbringing, I shouldn’t insult anybody even if that person insults me to destructive level, and even when I know the person insulting me is full of insults. Seldom, if ever, did I respond to any attempt to assassinate my personality. What I do know, however, is the fact that whomever insults others has his/her own unresolved problems. Some have their paranoid situation, or to some extent have genetic mental health problem.
So, I can’t be responsive to everybody that has a mouth. I know I am Ateny Wek Ateny, and need nobody to exist. Nobody will remake me, or unmake me no matter the ferocity of personal assassination. I know what I am, and need no approval from certain guys. The personal attacks directed against me at the week end by Ms. Daniella Valentino, the daughter of renowned Administrator Valentino Akol Wol Agany and Mother Anyuat Mou Akeen Mou, the daughter of the then Aguok-Bar area Paramount Chief, Mou Akeen Mou, my father’s colleague and contemporary was unprecedented. It was unprovoked and therefore, has nothing do with the public office I hold, nor did it have anything I must live to learn from. It was oblivious to the reasoning why public officials may deserve some sort of constructive criticism from time to time.
I sensed that Daniella has just picked-up a program of certain group who thinks they can totally destroy me through her. I knew, who are the members of this group and led by whom.Though, I knew Daniella very well more than what she may assume she knew about me, but I can’t touch her personality. She is very innocent. If any, Awut is just an insulting machine that can be fueled somewhere even sometimes against her own kin and kith. I knew she had license to insult at whim. She knew nobody in this country to be sacrosanct. Even God may face difficulty to find how to deal with her, if he was a member in the Government of South Sudan.
Even the President, First Vice President, Speakers of both upper and lower Houses are not immune to Awut’s unethical and uncivilized civil society uncontrollable activism. I was a member of civil society, but seldom did I touch anybody personally. Otherwise I would have ended up behind bars, since nobody would have pardoned me. I wouldn’t have successfully put ‘insanity’ as defense in the court of law in order to avoid being fine for attacking the personality of other. Justified or unjustified, the court of law would have appreciated my mental capacity to understand the consequences of personal attacks on public officials.
I knew Awut is insulting me because I hold public office. But, I don’t think she appreciates the different between constructive criticism aimed at correcting a given public body when necessary, and the personal integrity of the person being criticized. I was in London together with Awut, but she never insulted me before, the way she has been insulting me since joining the Office of the President. It is not one off slip of the tongue, but consistent chain of insults even when nothing has provoked those insults.
Yet, I still had respect for her. Apart from Awut’s visit to the First Lady in which she had an opportunity of posing picture with the President and the First Lady, the two occasions in which she visited the Office of the President were through me. Mindful of the fact that she (Awut) like millions of other South Sudanese who has the right to freedom of expression, as well as the right to request meeting any public official in the country, she should have been grateful to me for having received her.
Freedom of Expression must be observed with its limitations. I took it upon myself to allow Awut to visit me in my Office – therefore adding her to the numbers of women my detractors sees as higher compared to male visitors. Another woman accompanied Daniella Awut. But, the only question that cannot be appreciated by my detractors is to whether the women who are visiting my office who are counted for more than 80% of my victors (according to the statistic given by Mr. Deng Chapath, reiterated by Daniella), were invited, or they have asked me to allow them to visit me? If I did not invite them (women) to come to my office, as Ms. Daniella is my witness – since she came twice to my office in her two recent visits to South Sudan on her own request, then what are my detractors trying to imply? Am I now becoming victim of my own sympathy? What do I do with women that come to the Office of the President on their own request? Should I be mean to women, block them even when they have right as human to access any public office? Then as a man, why do people think that all women who come or request to come to public office are coming for sex in return for money? Is this how women are supposed to be seen even in another woman’s eye?
Otherwise, before I start to consider reviewing my relationship with all people, male and female, so long I am still in the Office of the President, I want to say this. I am always a man who speaks my mind. Notwithstanding, I am only careful to speak my mind when I am holding public office. I also look at the type of person I am supposed to respond to. At least I have the ability to know who should deserve my response, sorry let everyone who read this article know. But, if this was to persist, then it shouldn’t be taken for granted that one-day, one time I will be normal citizen to respond to anybody at anytime. Awut may not be wrong if she continues to insults others unabated. Attacking others personally, may be enjoyable as long as nobody amongst hundreds of Facebook’s friends would tell you that personal attacks is wrong.
Even those others, who may argue to know you better, may conspiratorially sit and watch. It is even worse when the other persons whom you think they knew you better, start sending symbols in appreciation or like the material in which you are being insulted. “The problem is not with the bad majority, but silence of the good minority” Martin Luther King (Jnr). Do, I really need to convince Awut that I am educated in order to be educated? As South Sudanese Awut’s education is enough to all of us, if practice in a respectful way.
Finally, considering the above reasons, I am urging the other part of Daniella that prevented her from publishing all dirty things about me, to please allow Daniella to publish what she has about me. Even, if Awut has life-machine for me, then she must switch-it off tonight. I am not only requesting the publication of the names of women she think I had slept with them while in others’ marriages, but also to publish the evidence as a matter of fact. Then, if, a woman/women named by Daniella thinks she/they is/are accused wrongly, or if I feel Awut is wrong, then it will be my time to take Awut to court, even if it means I fly to London, if she is not covered by the legal jurisdiction of South Sudanese laws. I challenge her to do it tonight, not tomorrow. As to the question of whether I am the real bad man of South Sudan, scapegoat or just a victim of my good heart, I feel the devil in the cage is turning the good man on my expense. The time is coming for the people to see who the devil is. Otherwise, only individuals from just one group are the one launching a personal attack against me. I will prevail over them by law and the Grace of God.The writer is the Press Secretary in the Office of the President, but the views expressed in this article are his own. So, please comment against Ateny Wek Ateny, insult me and please leave JI alone. My personality is my own and so it has nothing to do with the Office of the President. The writer can be reached on his Facebook Wall, or at atenywekayom@gmail.com