South Sudanese information minister, Michael Makuei Lueth attends a press conference in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, Sunday Jan. 5, 2014. Lueth threatened to apprehend Rebecca Nyandeng de Mabior, the widow of former SPLM, the late John Garang, as she is spreading “negative propaganda.” (AP Photo/Elias Asmare)
The government has vowed to not allow the automatic renewal of the mandate of the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) at the end of its current mandate in December 2017.
Addressing a press conference last week in Juba, the Minister of Information Michael Makuei Lueth told reporters that the government will review the mandate of the UN in the country. He accused the UN of causing situations in order for their mandates to be renewed.
“We are talking of revisiting the mandate because once the UN comes to your country, they will never write one day that this country is at peace we [the UN] are going away. They will continue all the time to write there is insecurity so that they continue to stay,” Makuei said.
“With the end of the mandate of the UN at the end of December, the government of South Sudan must be consulted before they talk of renewing anything. This idea of automatic renewal without the involvement of the government of South Sudan is not acceptable and will not happen,” he reiterated.
The government also said the mandate of the Regional Protection Force (RPF) also needs to be reviewed because they were supposed to be deployed at a time when the forces of Riek Machar were in Juba.
“They [the UN] do admit that Juba is at peace. If Juba is at peace then we need to revisit the mandate of the RPF and this is what we will do. We will have to revisit the mandate of the RPF… if they have come to assist the people and the government of South Sudan then we will have to revisit their mandate so that they render a better service to the people of South Sudan,” Makuei said.
Makuei also accused the UN forces of causing tensions when patrolling the streets of Juba. “….moving in the town with guns cocked creating unnecessary havoc to our people, sending a negative message that Juba is not yet at peace, and when somebody comes and see these UN forces moving in three or four trucks moving just like that with their guns then what message will that person take?”
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