A civil society activist has called on politicians living in the hotels to quit and go back to their homes or rent cheap houses.

Earlier this week, nine hotels accommodating peace delegates in Juba threatened to evict the occupants over an unsettled 10 million US dollar debt according to the letter seen by Juba Monitor written to the Chairperson of National Pre-transitional Committee (NPTC).

“Sir, it seems that your Chairmanship’s office is not responding to our request for settlement of our past due accounts since 2019 to present date. Indeed, we in the business community want to inform your office that we have responsibilities to workers and as well as to other credits we owe to other business communities in the market.

Therefore, we strongly urge your honorable office to settle our accounts as soon as possible so that we are able to clear our business responsibilities in the New Year 2021.

Last but not least, we are again giving your honorable Office final notice for five (5) days to relocate your clients from our accommodation hotels and apartments for normal business or pay in advance for their further accommodation services,” read part of the letter.

In a response to the claims of hotel’s owners, Edmund Yakani the Executive Director of Community Empowerment for Progress (CEPO) said the claim of nine hotel’s owners who are demanding the payment of 10 million USD for accommodation of politicians from the parties to the revitalized peace agreement is alarming and disturbing and has to be solve immediately.

“The claims from nine hotels that the government to pay 10 million USD for accommodation and meals for politicians from the parties that are signatories to the Revitalized Peace Agreement since 2019 until today is something that South Sudanese do not like to hear at this time.”

“This amount of money is alarming and it is disturbing, as civil societies since day one when the politicians were accommodated in hotels, we have been calling on them that please quit hotels and go to your houses,” Mr. Yakani revealed.

He said such amount of money is so huge and it could have been used to implement the full Revitalized Transitional Government of National Unity rather than paying for the accommodation of politicians who claim to be leaders of the country.

According to him, the politicians are showing a poor attitude to the public or citizens, and it means they are only visitors in their own country rather than leaders who will transform the country to that which all South Sudanese voted for.

However, the activist revealed that people were aware that these politicians are living in hotels because they are enjoying the safety and protection leaving the question of for how long will they continue be accommodated, unanswered.

“Our question is, are you really serious politicians? If yes, why then are you spending 10 million USD for accommodation only in the name of safety and protection to implement the agreement. Why are we always requesting money from foreign countries for the implementation of peace agreement yet we keep on spending our own money from public treasury on accommodation and meals of politicians,” Yakani questioned continuously.

If these politicians feel that they are in Juba in a city where they claim to be leaders and they want to be working for democratic transformation of governance in the country let them implement peace accordingly and provide security in order to have adequate services delivery to citizens and demonstrate clearly that they have trust and confidence in the peace agreement.

He said the poor attitude is portraying a bad example; meaning that the level of trust and confidence in the agreement between those politicians is very low, and the level of confidence that they are going to work as partners is low as well.

He concluded questioning why then the delegates were allowed to spend 10 million USD from the public treasury while many of them are appointed as leaders in the country. “Politicians, our message is that quit the hotels and go to your houses, and our appeal goes to president plus his colleagues in the presidency that is first vice president and the other four vice