Author: AmerFriendSudan

Former Ambassador Leads AFRECS

The AFRECS E-Blast has recently been featuring responses by American Christians to the question “Why haven’t you left?” – title of the inspiring book by Marc Nikkel, the late Episcopal missionary who worked with Southern Sudanese virtually up until his death from cancer in 2000.  In this issue we learn how Prof. Ellen Davis became involved in teaching at Renk Theological College and has been channeling students from Duke Divinity School to teach Sudanese students at Bishop Allison Theological College, a Sudanese seminary in exile in Uganda.

My own introduction to Sudan came with an assignment as Deputy Chief of Mission at the US Embassy in Khartoum in 1986.  I became acquainted with the growing armed struggle of the South Sudanese for self-determination.  My wife and I worshiped at the Episcopal Cathedral in Khartoum, under the leadership of impressive priests from South Sudan. That assignment was perhaps the most interesting of my Foreign Service career. Years after my retirement from the Foreign Service I returned to Sudan in 2011 for a two-year assignment as senior advisor to the U.S. Government on Darfur, just as South Sudan was making good on its independence.  My duties on several occasions made me a participant in negotiations with the South Sudanese leadership.  However, it was joining the Board of AFRECS in 2016 which put me in regular touch with the leadership of the Episcopal Church of the Sudans, including Archbishop Justin Badi Arama, who visited the US in 2019.  Two visits to South Sudan in 2018 and 2020 acquainted me with the dedicated leader of the Mothers Union, Mother Harriet Baka, with Archbishop Ezekiel Kondo, Primate of the Episcopal Church of Sudan, as well as a number of bishops and priests with whom we work directly.

I discovered that in a place where dysfunctional government places terrible burdens on ordinary women and men, the Episcopal churches are educating children, sponsoring trauma healing activities, promoting small business, and encouraging peace among ethnic groups hitherto engaged in violent conflict. That discovery has motivated me to work to ensure that AFRECS — our network of American churches, dioceses, faith-based organizations and individual Christians is providing support to these embattled churches as they seek to meet the needs of their people.

That’s why I’ve come back to the Sudans.

Executive Director

P.S.I hope to see many of you as we promote AFRECS’ work at the CEEP Network Annual Conference in Atlanta February 23-26.

“My People Live in the Old Testament”
                                                                                               

Ellen F. Davis
Amos Ragan Kearns Distinguished Professor of Bible and Practical Theology
Duke Divinity School

It was the vision of Daniel Deng Bul Yak, then the “baby” (newly installed) Bishop of Renk Diocese, that captured my attention in 1996, when he came to study at Virginia Theological Seminary. I was surprised by the unstinting effort he put into writing, and sometimes rewriting, essays for my Old Testament Interpretation course. VTS was, as he put it, “the first school I have ever attended that was not destroyed,” and further, this was his first exposure to critical biblical interpretation. Refusing to be daunted or bored by academic exercises that belonged to Western culture, he was thoroughly, rapturously engaged by the text itself: “My people live in the Old Testament. They need to know their story.” Over the course of that academic year, my own sense of vocation was touched by Bishop Daniel’s commitment to preparing himself to advance biblical education, and theological education more broadly, for the Christians of Sudan. I promised to come to Renk to teach when peace came to Sudan, although it was nearly eight years before the Comprehensive Peace Agreement of 26 May 2004 allowed us to make good on that promise.

Just ten days after the Agreement was signed, I traveled to Renk Bible School (now Renk Theological College) in the company of my colleague Richard Jones. There I encountered people for whom the Bible is a lifeline, people who would walk for a couple of days in order to study the book of Isaiah – the only book of the Bible that makes unmistakable reference to the people of the Upper Nile (see Isaiah 18). On the way home, Professor Jones and I imagined into being the Visiting Teachers Program, whereby Duke Divinity School and Virginia Seminary sent advanced students, alumni, and clergy to Renk and other theological colleges to teach Hebrew, Greek, and theological subjects for periods ranging from two weeks to three months. That program has now morphed into a partnership with Bishop Allison Theological College, a Sudanese seminary in exile in Arua, Uganda. One Duke Divinity alumnus has just completed more than four years on the faculty at BATC, and this summer three Duke students will travel there for a ten-week field education placement, under the supervision of Sudanese colleagues.

Studying Bible with Sudanese Christians – on multiple trips to Sudan until 2012, and later in Uganda – has transformed my reading of the Bible, making it three-dimensional and fully contemporary. They share a mindset with the biblical writers, one that I appreciate only across the vast distance imposed by my own full immersion in North American culture. Through them I have begun to develop a second-hand understanding of what it is to live in land torn by nearly constant armed conflict, to be an agrarian people inhabiting a semi-arid land, where human and animal life and the wellbeing of the land and its water sources are inextricably intertwined daily realities. Further, they showed me how those facts-on-the-ground shape religious sensibility. The very pressure of a corporate life that has been inexpressibly difficult and dangerous over generations has formed many African Christians in a stubborn faith that says, (contrary to what many Westerners would consider to be the relevant evidence) “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God’” (Pss. 14:1, 53:1). Against much evidence, they witness to the nature of tough hope, which the writers of both Testaments hold up as an essential religious practice. Moreover, my students and I have received from sisters and brothers in the Sudans the radical hospitality of those who have very few material possessions. Thus they have instilled in me an existential understanding of why hospitality, care for strangers and sojourners, who would not survive without that care, is the most important public value of the biblical world.

I hope my work with Sudanese Christians has contributed a little toward former Archbishop Daniel Deng Bul’s lifelong goal of educating leaders for the Episcopal Church of the Sudans. I know that it has profoundly shaped me as a teacher in my own local contexts and continues to do so. Through that work I have gained a sharper eye for what matters in our reading of the biblical text, what is potentially life-giving in every place and age. I pray that my students on both continents will advance that work, to the glory of God and the welfare of God’s people.

Ellen Davis serves on the Board of AFRECS

Update from Dane Smith 

A Backward Glance. Although 2021 could not be described as a good year in either South Sudan or Sudan, AFRECS was able to continue strong support for the Episcopal Church of South Sudan.  Glow MAPS (previously known as the war orphan school), led by Bishop John Gatteck at the displaced persons camp near Juba, grew from 350 to 500 students in grades 1-8.  It benefited from construction of new classrooms funded by St. Margaret’s Episcopal of Annapolis MD.  Our trauma healing program, attached to the nurture of saving groups by our partner Five Talents, expanded from Renk, Upper Nile, to Terekeka, Central Equatoria, in part because of a grant from the Gadsden Foundation (Grace Episcopal Church, Lexington VA).  AFRECS was able to finalize an arrangement to fund well drilling, essential infrastructure for the new campus of the Episcopal University of South Sudan.

Planning for 2022.  As the coronavirus and security permit, I plan to visit both Sudan and South Sudan. Hopefully, one or more Board members will accompany me.  AFRECS Treasurer Larry Duffee has been representing us in Juba this month, visiting his wife Suzy and carrying on AFRECS business.  This year we seek to increase support for teachers for the enlarged student body at Glow MAPs, while completing construction of school-related facilities.  Five Talents and AFRECS expect to increase the number of savings groups applying trauma healing curricula to their members in Renk and Terekeka.  We will continue to mobilize financial support for water infrastructure and scholarships for the Episcopal University.  We hope to greet many friends of AFRECS at the General Convention of the Episcopal Church in Baltimore July 7-14.  I also hope to travel to US churches with Sudanese congregations or ongoing relationships with Sudanese dioceses.

Meanwhile, amid the continuing failure of government to secure peace and law and order in South Sudan, peacebuilding continues to function at the local level.  In the waning days of December the South Sudan Council of Churches (SSCC) facilitated a peace agreement in Eastern Equatoria.  The Ibahure and Lohutuk communities in Lafon Country agreed to end five years of violence, often related to the theft of cattle.  The SSCC and PAX South Sudan (an offshoot of the Dutch faith-based peace organization) brought together elders, women, youth, and local and county authorities to encourage the agreement.  A second three-day peace conference in Pibor near the northeast border with Ethiopia  brought together Murle, Lou Nuer, and Dinka leaders.  They agreed to recommit to peaceful coexistence.

Three other positive signs for peace as the new year begins:  First, UNMISS, the UN peacekeeping force in South Sudan, reported that violence against civilians had decreased by 37 percent during the July-September period by comparison with the same quarter in 2020.  Violence fell sharply in Jonglei and Pibor, although it increased in Tambura in Western Equatoria.  Second, Sant’Egidio, the lay peacebuilding organization attached to the Vatican, reported agreement to renew negotiations among non-signatories to the 2018 peace agreement, including several groups that had previously rejected inclusion. Third, Archbishop Gallagher, the Vatican Secretary for Relations with States, visited Juba December 21-23 to meet with political and religious authorities, possibly laying the groundwork for a Papal visit to South Sudan in 2022.  If it occurs, Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby would likely accompany the pontiff.

The political future of Sudan became increasingly uncertain January 1, when Transitional Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok resigned.  His resignation had been expected. Lacking civilian support and apparently unable to exercise the leverage his reinstatement might have given him with the military, he recognized that he did not have a way forward.  His departure eliminates any vestige of legitimacy the post October 25 government might have had, but leaves the future uncertain.  Popular protests are continuing, even as the death count of civilians  continues to rise.  Seven died on January 17 alone. The protests are organized, often relying on neighborhood “resistance committees,” created during the period before the overthrow of Bashir, but still operating.  These committees are now demanding total civilian control of the transition. The military government is reportedly looking for a civilian figure to replace Hamdok, but prospective candidates are being deterred by the likely absence of popular support if they accept the appointment.

The State Department reiterates, “The United States continues to stand with the people of Sudan as they push for democracy. Violence against protesters must cease.” On January 17 Ambassador Lucy Tamblyn, a former director of the Sudan-South Sudan office, was appointed Chargé d’Affaires in Khartoum, pending nomination and confirmation of a new US ambassador to Sudan.

Executive Director

Why Haven’t You Left?
First Executive Director of AFRECS, Nancy Mott Frank, reflects on her decades-long involvement with the people of South Sudan.

Why would a middle-aged Caucasian woman in Rochester, New York become impassioned over South Sudan and with refugees arriving from that place?   Three reasons:  watching Lost Boys cope; taking an anthropology course that helped me see the world through tribal eyes; and an American missionary named Marc Nikkel.

As part-time Outreach Coordinator of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in 1996, I was trying to interest the congregation in the newest group of refugees to settle in Rochester. We are an outer-ring city congregation, long known for refugee work. At my invitation, Marc Nikkel visited our church.  Within a week, he was able to marry Christian faith, Dinka culture, liturgy, humor, history and reflection with our need to serve. My congregation became involved with the Lost Boys of 2000 (including Salva Dut, of Water for South Sudan). As advocates, we helped find housing and cars. We taught cooking and how to navigate government agencies.  We also funded theological education for Sudanese pastors, and provided facilities for study in refugee camps in Kenya.

The Sudanese lived a faith I had never seen before. One Sunday I took a group of refugees to a church in Rochester that they wanted to visit. The offering plate came to me unexpectedly. I was debating the bills in my wallet – “This one is too little; this one is too much.”  Then I watched as the Sudanese ­emptied their wallets into the plate. I learned the young men wouldn’t take good jobs with a local grocery store chain because they wouldn’t work on Sundays. They needed to go to church. I organized carpools to get them there.

I grew to be good friends with Marc Nikkel, who was supported by the Episcopal Church in the U.S. and the Church Missionary Society in the U.K.  I itinerated several of his USA and Irish trips to drum up interest in the issues of Sudan, the refugees there and here, and the Sudanese Church.  In 1998 I joined an exploratory Episcopal Church trip to South Sudan.   It was revelatory to be in an outdoor early morning congregation of 3,000 Episcopalians singing and praying, and to watch youth dancing joyfully. This was not the faith of my youth. This faith was alive — full of energy. It captured me, heart and soul.  It helped sustain my energies back home as I hauled furniture and sorted out bureaucratic snafus for the Rochester Sudanese.

Auditing a friend’s anthropology course gave me more understanding of these young men.  Their almost immediate need to purchase cars was a power symbol, replacing their traditional focus on cattle.  Whereas I carried a purse containing my important things, the Christians in Sudan carried crosses. In the village of Wuningor after a particularly muddy arrival in a dugout canoe , the women welcomed our group with foot washing.  This was not the one-footed, delicate version I have experienced on Maundy Thursday in my American church. This was a thorough, gentle, loving, caring wash.

The faith I saw and experienced through the Sudanese was the center of their lives. It didn’t fit in around their lives. It was their lives. It was in their souls. I could feel that, and it captured me.

It has been 20 years since those early days of Sudanese refugees in Rochester. Many of the Lost Boys brought Sudanese women to the USA to marry. Most moved to the Midwest or West for better jobs to support their families, or to be in a larger community of Sudanese. Families have separated due to domestic violence. Most of the first refugees struggled, but their Americanized children succeed.

I continue to be inspired by several Sudanese.  My job at St. Paul’s put me in contact with Salva Dut in 1996.  He still calls me “Mother”, which he pronounces Moth-ah. His concern for his father, sickened with parasites in Wau, moved him to found Water for South Sudan. He dug his first well in his father’s village. Since 2004 he has dug 500 wells, along with sanitation projects, as well as redoing many other organizations’ wells.

In the early 2000s, a wonderful single-mother family with many young children lived in our church apartment.  I advocated with my alma mater, St. Lawrence University, for one particularly talented child, Ajok (Victoria).  On a generous scholarship, she took advantage of every opportunity for internships, international travel, women’s rights, and racial justice conferences, as well as being published in her major, Spanish and Caribbean studies.  After joining the Peace Corps, she went to the Dominican Republic, was evacuated because of COVID, and currently works for the US Labor Department in Puerto Rico.

I am proud to have been the Executive Director of AFRECS when it was founded in the 2000s to promote companion links between American parishes and dioceses and Sudanese dioceses, then numbering thirty-one.  In that job I made frequent trips to South Sudan and Uganda to represent Americans who had become impassioned with the Sudanese people and Church. It is an honor to view the additional roles AFRECS is playing today in both Sudans.

I look back on this astounding period of my life as a formative one for my own faith. I experience God so much more because of those years, and I am thankful for that.

A Prayer for the Churches of the Sudans 

God of peace, God of love, we pray that your Grace may so strengthen the Churches of Sudan and South Sudan, that they may be beacons of love and forgiveness.  We pray that Gospel preaching may be so inspired that it will lead to reconciliation, enduring hope, and lasting peace.  We ask this in the name of Jesus, our Lord.  Amen.

The Rt. Rev. David Colin Jones
Bishop Suffragan (Retired), Episcopal Diocese of Virginia

Update from Dane Smith 

AFRECS has written to Senate Africa Subcommittee Chair Senator Chris Van Hollen and House Africa Subcommittee Chair Karen Bass urging hearings on South Sudan.  The letter recognizes massive US humanitarian aid, amounting to $811 million thus far in FY2021 and FY2022, but points to an apparent lack of policy focus.  The people of South Sudan are suffering from dysfunctional and corrupt government, which has failed to stop widespread communal violence or to respond to the plight of its citizens.  The letter calls for nomination of an ambassador to Juba and appointment of a new special envoy to cover South Sudan and Sudan.

In spite of the lack of progress on the political front in South Sudan, the Episcopal Church of South Sudan (ECSS) continues to deploy Stephen Mou, National Coordinator for Justice, Peace and Reconciliation (JPR), to carry out important workshops on peace, reconciliation and trauma healing in Northern Bahr al-Ghazal, Upper Nile, and Jonglei.  In September the JPR Commission office in Juba was closed for lack of funds, but the dedicated and highly competent Coordinator continues his work under the auspices of Archbishop of Northern Bahr al-Ghazal Moses Deng Bol.  Mou was responsible for training the trainers who lead the Five Talents-AFRECS trauma healing work in Renk and Terekeka. Details of Mou’s current work are featured below.

Meanwhile, uncertainty reigns in Sudan about the future of the transition.  Although, following massive protests throughout Sudan, Transitional Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok was reinstated November 21, after being ousted and detained October 25, protests have continued by large crowds refusing to accept Hamdok’s leadership.  The crowds have been shouting, “no negotiations, no legitimacy, no participation.”  They are insisting on the complete removal of the military from power.  Hamdok has asked the security forces to refrain from violence against protesters and called for the release of remaining detainees.  Assistance from Western donors and the international financial institutions remains in abeyance, pending clarification of the political situation.

Executive Director

Why Haven’t You Left?

Why I Was Drawn to AFRECS
by Frederick E. “(“Fritz”) Gilbert

I served in Khartoum during 1986-90 in the U.S.A.I.D. Mission as Deputy Mission Director and then Mission Director beginning in 1988. As Deputy my main responsibility was to oversee management of U.S. humanitarian assistance. Much of that was provided to areas of the north that were afflicted by drought, flooding, and even locust attacks. In the South the main need was to address food security problems caused by disruption of food production and distribution caused by the civil war between the Sudanese People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) and the Sudanese Army. The needs were huge, but USAID’s efforts to address them were shared with several UN agencies, the European Union, and a number of bilateral donors.

During this time my wife and I, together with Dane and Judy Smith, were members of the English-speaking congregation of All Saints Episcopal Cathedral in Khartoum. The services were usually led by the Reverend Sylvester Thomas Kambaya. We became admirers of him and wanted to arrange for him to study at Virginia Theological Seminary (VTS).  When we discussed this with the Rector of our Northern Virginia parish, he introduced us to Rev. Dr. Rich Jones, then Professor of Mission and World Religions at VTS. Rich arranged for Father Sylvester to spend a year at VTS.

Rich and I became friends, and it soon became apparent that he had a strong interest in the Episcopal Church of Sudan (ECS) and in finding ways to support its work and strengthen it as an institution.

In the early 2000s, well after I had retired from the USAID Foreign Service, Rich told me about his desire to start an organization comprised of supporters of the ECS and asked for my participation.  I agreed because the ECS seemed to me to be an unfolding miracle. The number of baptized members was growing rapidly in what seemed to me to be an amazing way. The ECS had a lot of dedicated and inspiring, but often undertrained, clergy. Nevertheless, most of the clergy and many of the lay members seemed to this cowboy to be exceptionally committed to living into their present and potential roles as members of the Body of Christ.

It seems to me that the ECS and other denominations have the potential to serve as the country’s most important civil society institutions. As I see it, we friends of the Episcopal Church of the Sudans should thankfully embrace our opportunities to support the institutional development that will enhance the realization of this aim.

Trauma Healing and Peacebuilding Training Held in Wau and Aweil
by Stephen M. Mou

Report from the Coordinator
Episcopal Church of South Sudan Justice, Peace & Reconciliation Commission (ECSS/JPRC)
November 2021

The JPRC national office in the ECSS Provincial Office building in Juba was closed in September 2021 because of the lack of funding to pay staff salaries. Rev. Stephen was redeployed to Wau at the end of September 2021, where he now reports to Archbishop Moses Deng Bol, Archbishop of ECSS Northern Bahr el Ghazal Internal Province and where he will be coordinating and carrying out peacebuilding and trauma-healing activities in Northern Bahr el Ghazal), Upper Nile, and Jonglei Internal Provinces.

Workshop in Wau, Northern Bahr el Ghazal Internal Province (NBeG IP)

On 5^th and 6^th November 2021 ECSS/JPRC facilitated a Peace Building and Trauma Healing workshop in Wau. The workshop was attended by 24 participants, including five bishops from NBeG IP, 5 bishops from Eastern Bahr el Ghazal (EBeG) IP, seven women, three youth and four priests. Rev. Stephen was assisted and supported by SMARD (Solidarity Ministries Africa for Reconciliation & Development), a national faith-based peace and development non-governmental organization, and by local churches.

The bishops from EBeG IP appreciated the facilitation skills and the content of the tools used during the workshop and requested ECSS/JPRC to extend the training to EBeG IP. They also requested more manuals and handouts to enable them to read more.

The participants wanted the training to be increased from two days to seven days, with a certificate provided at the end of the week-long training.

The participants asked ECSS/JPRC to take the training to each of the dioceses in NBeG IP and EBeG IP, to help community members understand the importance and benefits of peacefulness and good community relations.

Workshop in Aweil, Northern Bahr el Ghazal Internal Province (NBeG IP)

In collaboration with the Dinka Rek Language Committee and supported by local churches, ECSS/JPRC facilitated a Trauma Healing Workshop in Aweil, the state capital of Northern Bahr el Ghazal State on 12^th and 13^th November 2021 for the heads of twenty-seven different Christian denominations. During the workshop, the participants requested the same workshop to be facilitated on 18^th December 2021 in Aweil for more than 135 participants. The heads of the churches said that each denomination would select five participants, including the head of the denomination and would raise funds for their food and accommodation in Aweil. Transport for participants would be provided by the local churches. The heads of denominations requested the facilitators to raise their own funds for their transport, accommodation and feeding.

[Editor’s note on “Dinka Rek”.] There are three major dialects within the Dinka community, Dinka Cham, Dinka Padang and Dinka Rek. Each has developed its own hymns and books and translated the Bible. The Dinka Rek Language Committee was established to lead on the translation of the Bible, collect Christian songs, and write stories for books in the Dinka Rek dialect. Rev. Stephen advises on Dinka Rek language development as well as teaching about the impact of trauma in the community.]

Challenges

• ECSS/JPRC lacks funds to print handouts, certificates and buy enough training materials for workshop participants.
• ECSS/JPRC still lacks salaries for staff.

Mitigation Measures

• ECSS/JPRC Coordinator will continue to lobby for funding to cover activity costs and staff salaries.
• NBeG IP will help JPRC to reach out to donors to support peace building and trauma healing through JPRC.

Outline of Proposed Activities into 2022 (funding permitting)

• 18^th-21^st December 2021. ECSS/JPRC will facilitate a Peace Building and Trauma Healing workshop in Aweil and the workshop will be supported by the local Inter-Church Committee.
• 10^th-14^th January 2022. ECSS/JPRC plans to facilitate a 4-day Trauma Healing workshop in Malakal, Upper Nile State. ECSS Upper Nile Internal Province will raise funds for the workshop.
• 24^th-28^th January 2022. ECSS/JPRC plans to facilitate a Peace and Trauma Healing workshop in Abyei.
• 7^th-11^th February 2022. ECSS/JPRC plans to facilitate a Peace and Trauma Healing workshop in Wau.

American reporters and camera teams from the Washington Post and Cable News Network have recently been documenting the suffering and displacement in the Sudd, a wetland the size of England in  the center of the Sudans extending from Mongalla in Central Equatoria to Malakal in Upper Nile, and in Bentiu.  For details and compelling photography, see these links:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/interactive/2021/south-sudan-flooding/

https://www.cnn.com/videos/world/2021/12/06/flooding-in-sudan-clarissa-ward-pkg-tsr-vpx.cnn

Please continue to pray for the homeless, the sick and hungry, and those laboring to render material aid.

Young displaced people return to a camp from Bentiu.

1.  Call upon the people of South Sudan to value the sanctity of life and promote peaceful co-existence among communities;
2. Appreciate the Parties of the Revitalised Agreement for the Resolution of Conflict in the Republic of South Sudan (R-ARCSS) for the progress made, but still urge them to expedite the implementation of the remaining parts, especially Security Arrangements;
3. Humbly request the guarantors to the R-ARCSS and friends of South Sudan to extend any practical support needed to enable the government to accelerate the process of the graduation of unified forces in the training centres;
4. Strongly urge all the Parties to the R-ARCSS to resume Rome Peace Initiative;
5. Strongly urge oil companies to protect the environment from oil pollution and compensate those affected by oil pollution in oil-producing areas;
6. Resolved that first Sunday of July yearly should be a tree planting day as a means of preserving the Environment;
7. Request humanitarian agencies to continue supporting flood-affected people all over the country;
8. Resolve to uphold biblical teachings and declare a decade of discipleship and missions in ECSS to nurture and strengthen Christian communities in the faith;
9. Request the government of the Republic of South Sudan to enact a law for relocation of cattle from greater Equatoria region to their places of origin; and
10. We believe that despite the challenges being faced by the Church in South Sudan and around the globe, the Episcopal Church of South Sudan remains one of the vibrant tools for peace building, and trauma healing in the Country.

Update from Dane Smith 

The Episcopal Churches of South Sudan and Sudan, where the recent military coup may have rendered Christians once again vulnerable, deserve our strong support. The following news only highlights the importance of our relationships, our advocacy, and our prayers.

In the AFRECS E-blasts we continue to bring you stories of resilience.  Over the next several months we are highlighting the voices of our Board members as they recall why, after decades, their call to serve the people of the Sudans still motivates them. We ask you, our readers, to share your stories.  Email to richard.j.jones@comcast.net.  

The Washington Post led off Monday’s edition with “Fading Hope in South Sudan.” It describes the experience of a Nuer father whose village was burned and wives were raped by “government allied” forces in 2014.  He walked north with his family to a UN base in Bentiu which became a displaced persons camp for 108,000, South Sudan’s largest.  UN troops stood in guard towers to protect against invaders.  This year he discovered the guard troops had disappeared, replaced by a mixed police force of the two groups involved in the original fighting.  That happened because emerging violent hotspots around the country caused the UN peacekeeping force to regroup, reducing numbers at the IDP camps. He and his family had until recently been receiving daily food from the World Food Program.  Since lack of funding forced the WFP to cut rations last month, he has begun eating one meal a day so that his kids have enough, but their hair now has an orange tinge, tell-tale sign of malnutrition.

The Post describes a coincident loss of hope — and interest — in South Sudan on the part of the international community, occasioned by the spectacle of continuing inter-communal violence, vast government corruption, and severely dysfunctional administration.  My former colleague in the State Department Sudan Envoy’s Office, Cameron Hudson, has described the international disenchantment with assistance:  “We owned it before, and we don’t want to own it any more.”  The U.S. has designated neither a new ambassador for Juba nor a new special envoy for South Sudan. (A flock of Biden ambassador nominations have been blocked in the US Senate.)

In this appalling situation, South Sudanese churches have continued to function, giving hope to the people and building peace. Archbishop Justin Badi Arama convened November 11-14 in Juba the Provincial Synod of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan. The theme was “Building the Church on a Strong Foundation.” New foundation-building leaders are emerging, such as Rev. Isaac Ephraim, recently consecrated Bishop of Ezo, a remote diocese of 18,000 parishioners on the border of the Congo and the Central African Republic.  As Leslie Siegmund of St. Francis Episcopal of Great Falls Virginia writes below, the new bishop took the diocese immediately into a strategic planning exercise “to see the church and the community united and transformed spiritually, economically, socially, politically and environmentally protected.”

May our continued witness to the suffering of our brothers and sisters inspire others to offer what aid and assistance they are able. As we are inspired by the many projects and their leaders that continue in spite of great obstacles.  At this time of Thanksgiving, we invite your financial support so that our work and that of our partners may continue.

Executive Director

Join Us in Being Present

Throughout the long years of conflict the people of the Sudans have endured, the message they have imparted to us, their American friends, is….do not forget us….remember us….pray for us…do not abandon us.  We endeavor to keep the connections alive through our work with AFRECS.  We can offer our presence whenever we are able to travel.  We offer our witness to the ongoing struggles.    We offer our testimony to what we have seen and are seeing.  We advocate for just policies and actions.  We aim to provide material support as we are able.

We asked our Board members to reflect on why they stay connected.  To ponder the question Marc Nikkel, was famously asked:  Why Haven”t You Left?  (Marc went to the Sudan in 1981 and brought with him a commitment to peace and reconciliation.  Marc was ordained a priest in the Episcopal Church in the Chapel of Bishop Gwynne College in 1987, and spent the remainder of his life living among and loving the people of South Sudan.)

Here is the first in a series of those reflections.  You also stand with the people of the Sudans and we invite your reflections.  Join us in maintaining and strengthening the connections that offer hope.

My Visits Established Bonds of Affection and Appreciation
By The Rt. Rev. David Colin Jones

On my first trip to South Sudan, I attended a Partner’s Meeting in Juba.  I was impressed by the depth of knowledge and dedication of the partners – many of whom had dedicated their lives to this work.  I left with a personal burden to share and support the extraordinary work of the Episcopal Church in South Sudan and Sudan.

On my second visit, I was privileged to attend a Bishop’s Retreat in Yei led by the Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, and Bishop Frank Gray. During one of our breaks, I met Micah, then the Bishop of Terekeka.  Bishop Micah shared his experience of personally founding his diocese by walking into an area north of Juba, finding the tribal chief and personally sharing the gospel.  During that testimony, a man appeared who had been crippled from birth.  Micah laid hands upon him and a dramatic healing followed.  Word of the healing spread like wildfire.  The chief and then others burned their idols and were baptized.  A congregation was founded and more and more people were led to faith.  Ultimately a new diocese was established and Micah became their bishop. I left with a renewed appreciation for personal evangelism and a genuine love for the Church in the Sudans. 

On my third visit, I led a retreat for the House of Bishops in Juba.  That experience stands out for me of one of the greatest privileges of my episcopate.  I shared my faith with people of extraordinary faith and was blessed in return.  That retreat preceded the Provincial Synod in which Daniel Deng Bul was elected for a second five-year term as Archbishop. My affection for the bishops in the Sudans continues to this day.

David Jones is a member of the AFRECS Board of Trustees

Celebrating the Life and Ministry of  Bishop Micah
by Daniel Lasuba 22 Jul 2019

Retired Bishop Micah Laila Dawidi of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan, Diocese of Terekeka* died in Juba on the 17^th July 2019.  Bishop Micah Laila was the champion of the Christian faith who served God with complete humility. He was a dedicated servant who served the people of God in different capabilities and responsibilities within the ECSS.

In the 1980’s he served as the Principal and Head Master of Episcopal Church of Sudan Juba Model Primary school, where as a child I attended my kindergarten and primary education. Late Bishop Micah Laila had a special attention to education as a key tool to ensure better future for the children in our nation. Through his leadership Late Bishop Micah instilled in us the importance of valuing education, he instilled in us discipline to love and serve God. Many of who he taught today are responsible people in different fields of life, and still holding dearly the values of all the things he taught us.

Late Bishop Micah Laila was a champion of peace, human rights and love for South Sudanese. During the struggle while he was the Assistant Bishop of the Diocese of Juba. Bishop Micah stood for the fundamental rights of the people of South Sudan in the face of evil deeds perpetuated against them. He stood against oppression, persecution and inequality the least among others to mention. Late Bishop Micah Laila was a courageous leader who spoke the truth with love without fear or favor, he stood for what is right and just. Late Right Reverend Micah has been one of the leaders who had always advocated for peace and the unity of the people of South Sudan, where he always reminded people that true peace comes from God because Jesus said “I am the Prince of Peace”.

He was a man full of humility and he loved engaging with people. He was easily accessible, I vividly remember as a young pupil at Juba model his office was always open for any pupil.

I consider he was a special gift from God to the Episcopal Church of Sudan and South Sudan and to the Republic and the people of South Sudan.

Note:
Terekeka, covers about 4,000 square miles, is also home to the Mundari ethnic group, whose members are known for their reliance on the Ankole-Watusi, a species of large cows with long, curved horns. The capital of the state of Terekeka is the city of Terekeka located on the western bank of the Nile River. The town lies approximately 53 miles north of Juba, the capital and largest city of South Sudan.

Prayers

Gracious and loving God, we give you thanks for the wonders of your creation.  Thank you for the beauty of this world, for the wonders of life and for the mystery of love.  Increase our insight into your purposes for the human race, and new wisdom and determination in making provision for its future in accordance with your will; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

We remember all the people in this world who live with injustice, terror, disease and death as their constant companions.  Have mercy upon us.  Help us eliminate our cruelty to our neighbors.  Strengthen our resolve to simplify our lives and to care for our Mother Earth so that all may live in health.
We pray especially for the people of the Sudan and of South Sudan that they may continue to pursue peace and justice and that we may continue to be present for them.

South Sudanese refugees find home, and church, in Syracuse
By JESSICA MUNDIE
October 21, 2021
https://apnews.com/article/middle-east-africa-religion-sudan-new-york-7a48e8f5ca3e28b917332e7db9b6e93b

This undated photo provided by Garang Achiek in October 2021 shows members of the Diangdit Episcopal Chapel congregation with the Rev. John Crosswaite, center left, former canon to the Ordinary of the Episcopal Diocese of Central New York, in East Syracuse, N.Y. The congregation is made up of refugees from South Sudan who pray in their native language, Dinka. (Garang Achiek via AP)

(RNS) — On the corner of East Avenue and West Yates Street in East Syracuse, New York, sits Emmanuel Episcopal Church. The quaint building, with its bright white exterior and cherry red doors, is the home to not one, but two distinct congregations. The first, a modest parish of 25 Americans, meets early on Sunday morning, and the other, a group of South Sudanese refugees, in the midafternoon.

Diangdit Episcopal Chapel has been worshiping out of Emmanuel Church for three years. The congregation is made up of refugees from South Sudan who pray in their native language, Dinka. Their success has been fostered by the Episcopal Diocese of Central New York and a local interfaith resettlement agency that found them a place to hold services and supported their integration into the community.

 

A woman leads a child through high water in Pakwar, Upper Nile State, in early October.

We are deeply that grateful that contributions from you, our supporters, continue to nurture AFRECS in expanding our impact.  You make a difference in the essential peacebuilding work of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan, so needed in these challenging times. We hope you will consider taking a moment to consider a gift for our work with the people of the Sudans and to offer a prayer for their nations. You can contribute online at https://afrecs.org or send a check made out to AFRECS to P.O. Box 3327, Alexandria, VA 22302.This issue of the AFRECS E-Blast was compiled by Board member Anita Sanborn.

Update from Dane Smith 

The military coup undertaken by Sudanese Sovereignty Council Chair Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan October 25 has encountered enormous resistance from the Sudanese population and the international community. Protests broke out immediately in Khartoum and its sister city Omdurman and in other Sudanese cities. They were met forcibly.  At least 11 protesters were killed initially by live fire from the security forces.  There have been extensive arrests of civil society leaders.  The US and other Western nations have denounced the coup, as have the United Nations and the African Union.  The UN Security Council has demanded the reinstatement of the transitional government.  The African Union has suspended Sudan from normal activities.  The US has halted a $700 million aid package.  With advance notice, massive protests took place on Saturday, October 30, involving hundreds of thousands, with reports of three more protesters shot to death. We have not yet seen any signs of a reconsideration by Gen. al-Burhan. These protests are likely to continue as the forces which led to the overthrow of Bashir remain mobilized and now have considerable experience in non-violent resistance. The lengths that the military are prepared to go to remain in power are uncertain.

AFRECS is concerned about the impact of the military coup on Christians in Sudan. Although they are a small minority of the overall population (5.4%, according to the Pew Research Center), there are  significant numbers of Sudanese Copts, Catholics and Episcopalians. Most Sudanese Episcopalians are originally from the Nuba Mountains of South Kordofan, but are now widely spread through the southwest and east of the country in five dioceses: Khartoum, Wad Medani, Port Sudan, El Obeid, and Kadugli/Nuba Mountains. Sudanese Christians were elated at the overthrow of longtime President Bashir in 2019. The Transitional Government separated religion from the state, launching an era of religious freedom.  Although Gen. al-Burhan is not reputed to be an Islamist, he is currently getting support from elements that backed the previous regime. So Christians rightly fear that their new freedom could be reversed.

The South Sudanese Government reacted cautiously to the coup, calling on all parties to “return to dialogue” and asserting that it “remained steadfast in supporting the aspirations of the Sudanese peoples.” It noted that “stability in Sudan has a direct bearing on our common goal of building greater stability in the region.” Tension between Khartoum and Juba had eased under the Transitional Government. Prime Minister Hamdok, now under house arrest in Khartoum, paid a well-received visit to Juba in August.

Executive Director

A Bad Day in Ibba

Excerpts from the Message from Bishop Wilson Kamani,Diocese of Ibba,to Buck Blanchard

Greetings to you from Ibba! Thank God I am able to write to you because 1st October (2021) was a bad day in Ibba. Ministry launched deworming program in Ibba schools but the program turned dangerous for the students. Pupils at Ibba Boarding School, St Peters, Hope Primary School, Nabanga, our Secondary School, were given overdoses and they were badly affected.

At 7:00 pm, October 1, I gave a lift to the students from our Health Center to Boarding School.   On my way back I fell into an ambush in which three bullets were triggered at me but I survived. Civilians in Ibba are so disappointed with the government. Schools are not functioning but we are having series of meeting with parents and teachers to explore the possibility of reopening the schools.

I have a huge assignment before me to bring people together. As a diocese, I have scheduled  a community meeting to take place on 5th January 2022 targeting 22 chiefs, representatives of youth and women in every boma [administrative division], head of organized forces, all pastors, County Commissioner, administrative officers and some local organizations to answer the question” how do we work together in Ibba for the betterment of Ibba?” This meeting will have a huge impact in the community, if it’s done. $3500 will enable this meeting to be done. ……. your prayers are very important. I have not forgotten the request from AFRECS. 

God bless you.
+ Wilson

Ezo Diocese Welcomes New Bishop (and a Working Well)
by Leslie Siegmund

The Rt. Rev. Isaac Ephraim Bangisa was enthroned as the new bishop of Ezo on October 10, 2021, in a ceremony attended by more than 2,000 parishioners, government officials, and clergy. Just three weeks earlier, Bishop Isaac had been among the four new bishops consecrated in Juba by the Primate of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan, the Most Rev. Dr. Justin Badi Arama.

On this side of the Atlantic Ocean, parishioners of St. Francis Episcopal Church in Great Falls, Virginia, celebrated the new bishop’s enthronement. St. Francis has had a covenant with the Diocese of Ezo since 1998. This relationship has involved visits between Virginia and Ezo, as well as fundraising and, most importantly, ongoing prayers on both sides.

The Ezo Diocese, with about 18,000 parishioners, lies in a relatively isolated spot in western South Sudan, adjoining both the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Central African Republic. The closest city is Yambio, about 100 miles away, which is connected by an unpaved road. Travel and communication are both difficult.

Wasting no time and taking advantage of the presence of many key people, Bishop Isaac held a two-day strategic planning meeting immediately following his enthronement in Ezo. The result was a five-year plan for the Ezo Diocese, outlining goals, challenges, costs, and planned activities. The new plan will serve as a roadmap for Ezo as it works to fulfill its vision:  “. . . to see the church and the community united and transformed spiritually, economically, socially, politically and environmentally protected.”

There was one physical improvement that could be celebrated immediately: the repair of a well on the Ezo Diocesan compound. The compound had been without fresh water for several years, and St. Francis had been working to raise money to fix or replace the two wells. Although funds were raised in 2020, the pandemic delayed the repairs, and it was difficult to find a drilling company willing to make the trek to Ezo. But in September of this year, a drilling company was identified, funds were transferred, and one of the wells was repaired, much to the delight of Ezo parishioners and staff. Plans are now being made to replace the second well.

St. Francis rejoices with the people of Ezo and their new bishop as they embark on their strategic plan. And St. Francis welcomes interest from other U.S. churches regarding ways to support the people of Ezo.

For more photos and details about Bishop Isaac’s enthronement in the Ezo Diocese, visit the St. Francis webpage at https://stfrancisgreatfalls.org/2021/10/21/enthronement-of-bishop-isaac-ephraim-in-ezo/. To find out more about St. Francis and Ezo, contact Leslie Siegmund at lesiegmund@aol.com.

Focus Area: The Diaspora
A Snapshot from Roanoke, VA

Ayen’s* husband abandoned her and her five children several years ago. Barely literate, she works at a popular restaurant chain in Roanoke five days a week. She brings home about $12,000 a year to feed, clothe, and house herself and her children, whose ages range from 8 to 18. They live in public housing in southeast Roanoke. The youngest child recently got into the gifted program at Highland Park Elementary School. The oldest child just graduated from the Boys Home of Virginia (a residential educational program for boys ages 6 to 17 and a ministry of the Episcopal Diocese of Southwestern Virginia) and will attend college next year on a full scholarship.

In Ayen’s free time, when she isn’t working ten-hour shifts, cleaning, cooking, or raising her children, she tries to muster the energy to study for her American citizenship.   Ayen is just one of many South Sudanese refugees eking by in Roanoke. She manages, in part, thanks to the Rev. Sue Bentley, rector of St. James Episcopal Church in Roanoke. The Rev. Bentley arranged for Ayen’s oldest son to attend the Boys Home, found someone to donate a van to the family for $1, and has gone to court on their behalf.  Ayen affectionally calls Rev. Bentley, “Mother Sue”. Since 2009, Sudanese and South Sudanese like Ayen have worshipped at St. James where the South Sudanese Christian Fellowship meets on Sundays at 5:30 p.m. in the parish hall.

Church has always been a place where Ayen found peace, even in the midst of war, displacement, and relocation. In South Sudan, “we have a lot of church,” Ayen says. According to Pew Research Center’s “The Future of World Religions,” 60.5% of the population in South Sudan in 2020 were Christian. In South Sudan, church provided Ayen a respite from the constant news of war.  “Every day you have to hear about war,” she says. Day-long church services with hymns that “calm you, make you happy,” she says, gave her a break from that. “The time goes by without you knowing what time it is,” she adds.

Members of the Sudanese congregation at St. John’s Episcopal Church in Roanoke, Virginia surround the Rector, Sue Bentley.

The refugees who meet at St. James have fled decades of violence. The Second Sudanese Civil War, from 1983 to 2005, left about two million dead from famine, fighting, and disease and about four million people displaced, according to the U.S. Committee for Refugees. South Sudan, formed six years after the war, still faces government corruption, violence, starvation, and a decimated economy. Ayen shares, “A lot of Sudanese communities are struggling, they don’t have houses, they don’t have any place to stay. My country is not doing good. It’s not. It’s going backwards.” According to an April 2021 United Nations report 7.2 million South Sudanese require emergency food assistance.

*Ayen’s name has been changed to protect her privacy.

This article, written by Christine Morlock for the newsletter of St. John’s Episcopal Church in Roanoke, Virginia has been edited for this E–blast.

Kual Aguer Receives Limited Medical Attention Condition Worsens

The daughter of the former governor of Northern Bahr el Ghazal, Kual Aguer, is appealing to President Salva Kiir to grant her father urgent release to seek medical attention.  Adhel says her father is allowed to seek medical attention outside the prison, but not outside the country, where the family would like to seek better medical attention. Aguer, (shown in bed in the above photo) has been admitted at Promise hospital under the surveillance of the security guarding him in detention.

She told Eye Radio that her father’s health situation has worsened.

“This appeal is based on humanitarian grounds. With any grantee that whatever he [Kiir] wants from us, let him allow our father to get his treatment and after that, he can proceed with his process,” Adhel told Eye Radio on Tuesday.

According to the code of criminal procedure 2008, a person arrested by the police as part of an investigation may be held in detention, for a period not exceeding 24 hours for investigation.

Kuel Aguer was arrested in early August 2021 by the national security for allegedly signing a petition of the People’s Collation for Civil Action a group that called for a nationwide protest and resignation of President Salva Kiir and his cabinet.

“We praise God that Kuel Aguer Kuel, former governor of Northern Bahr al-Ghazal State, held since August without charges, has been moved from prison to a hospital under security. We continue to pray for his release to seek better medical care. God is good!”
Tuesday, October 5, 2021
Eye Radio

We give thanks for your continued support in prayer and generosity

We are deeply that grateful that contributions from you, our supporters, continue to nurture AFRECS in expanding our impact.  You make a difference in the essential peacebuilding work of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan, so needed in these challenging times. We hope you will consider taking a moment to consider a gift for our work with the people of the Sudans and to offer a prayer for their nations. You can contribute online at https://afrecs.org or send a check made out to AFRECS to P.O. Box 3327, Alexandria, VA 22302

Back Issues of this E–Blast remain accessible at www.afrecs.org/News under the heading “E–Blast”. Specific names, words, and phrases may be located using the “Search” field.This issue of the AFRECS E–Blast was compiled by Board member Anita Sanborn.

AFRECS Editors encourage readers to submit their news for publication; Please submit your news to Caroline Klam at klamcd621@gmail.com.

President’s Message 

ECSS Redeploys Reverend Stephen Mou for Reconciliation Work

by Richard J. Jones

The Reverend Stephen M. Mou, until recently National Coordinator of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan (ECSS) Justice, Peace and Reconciliation Committee (JPRC) in Juba, will be moving to Wau. There, he will be based at the ECSS Internal Province of Northern Bahr el Ghazal, whose Finance Office will provide accounting and financial-reporting support. Stephen will also be supporting the ECSS Internal Provinces of Upper Nile and Jonglei. In resolutions of Synod over the past decade and in statements from Archbishop Justin Badi Arama, Primate of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan, the reconciling of intercommunal conflicts has long been a priority in the work of the ECSS. Senior clergy including Enock Tombe, retired bishop of Rajaf and sometime Provincial Secretary, as well as local clergy have been deployed to mediate conflicts in diverse locations. However, other urgent needs have prevented reliable and adequate funding for the Provincial JPRC staff and peace-building activities. Central Equatoria Internal Province’s Archbishop Samuel Enosa Peni, Chairman of the Board of the ECSS Mission and Evangelism Department, which includes JPRC, has therefore had to end Stephen’s contract as JPRC National Coordinator and Stephen has been given responsibility for ECSS’s peace work in Northern Bahr el Ghazal, Upper Nile and Jonglei Internal Provinces. For the past three years the Diocese of Salisbury and Christian Aid in the UK, along with the Church in Wales, provided funds towards part-salaries for the Provincial JPRC staff. The Reverend David Copley, Director of Mission Personnel and Global Partnerships for The Episcopal Church in the U.S., is seeking donors to provide a salary for Stephen and his peace-building work in those three ECSS Internal Provinces.

Serious Tensions in Khartoum

Sudanese protesters take part in a rally demanding the dissolution of the transitional government, outside the presidential palace in Khartoum, Sudan, Saturday, Oct. 16, 2021. (AP Photo/Marwan Ali)

In the last few days there has been a flurry of messages coming from church leaders in Sudan and elsewhere worrying about demonstrations in Khartoum allegedly calling for resumption of military rule.  The perception appears to be slightly miscast.  There was a protest on Saturday involving  5-7000 people, some of them bused in for the event.  A second day of protest occurred Sunday.  On Monday protesters were dispersed by police.  Sudan’s cabinet held an emergency meeting that day, after Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok called recent unrest the “worst and most dangerous crisis” of the country’s precarious two-year transition since the fall of Bashir.  The cabinet meeting urged protesters not to escalate the situation.  The protesters are calling for the dissolution of the interim government and its replacement by something else, but not explicitly for the resumption of military rule, although informed observers fear that pro-military elements may take advantage of the situation.  A pro-government counter-protest is reportedly planned for October 21. In response the US Government is urging the Government of Sudan to move forward with measures needed to implement the transition to elections.  Stay tuned.

Devastating Floods in South Sudan

The main story in South Sudan so far this month is floods, which again this year have had a devastating impact. One report indicates that 623,000 have been displaced since May, including 90% of the population of Unity State.  The worst hit areas are Unity and Jonglei states, which account for more than half of the displaced.  Some of those who have lost their homes have fled to Juba, while others have organized makeshift camps along roadsides. The UN and international NGOs are providing food, water purification tablets, plastic sheeting, and mosquito nets.  The floods have reported destroyed 200 schools in Jonglei.
World Food Program approves Diocese of Nzara Schools for Food Supplies

Report from Ray Gaebler, Diocese of Iowa (September 6)

I received wonderful news from The Rev. Capt. Emmanuel Ramadan that on August 31 The World Food Program approved the Nzara schools for food support.  Many thanks for the persistence and hard work of the people in Nzara and Iowa to make this possible.  The schools had to meet three criteria.  They had to have a good kitchen.  They had to have secure storage.  They had to have a good fence.  A WFP representative came in December and judged the kitchen and storage adequate but a fence was needed.  Special appreciation goes to The Rev. Bob North for his leadership in raising the needed funds.  This is not insignificant because the school that needed the fence has land about the size of two football fields.  It required a lot of fencing and Fr. Bob was able to find sufficient donors to make it happen.  Additionally the One World One Church Commission endorsed a grant of $2000 to help pay off the final loan to complete the fence.

This feeding program will benefit four schools operated by the Diocese of Nzara; St. Timothy Nursery and Primary School, ECS (Episcopal Church of South Sudan) Nursery and Primary School Nzara, Zereda Nursery and Primary School, and Nzara one Nursery and Primary School Nzara.  Today the schools launched a campaign to spread the word that all four schools are open and providing a meal for the students.  More children will attend and will learn more when they are not worried about where to get their next meal.

If this is not enough good news, I am also pleased to spread the word that Nzara has started a secondary school.  Approximately 77 students in Nzara passed the test to complete Primary Eight level.  The nearest secondary school is in Yambio.  Although it is only 15 miles away it is not practical for a daily commute.  To continue their education these students would have to find a friend or relative that could take them in for a school year.  The state of Western Equatoria has only six secondary schools.  Based on the population you could compare that to Iowa if we had only twelve high schools.  This school started outside “under the mango trees” in early August.  They started with 11 teachers, 3 full time, and 28 students.  They borrowed chairs from St. Timothy’s School or brought a chair from home so they could learn socially distanced during Covid.  These students are the future of South Sudan.  If they succeed, South Sudan will succeed.  St. Timothy’s Nursery and Primary School started the same way eleven years ago with 36 students.  The Nzara schools now serve almost 2,000 students.  The people of Nzara can make this work and we can help them.  The grant mentioned above for the fence added another $1,000 to help pay the teachers and purchase supplies, which right now consist mainly of chalk for the blackboard.

Praise and thanks to God for the faith and determination of the people of Nzara and for this  accomplishment.
We give thanks for your continued support in prayer and generosity

We are deeply that grateful that contributions from you, our supporters, continue to nurture AFRECS in expanding our impact.  You make a difference in the essential peacebuilding work of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan, so needed in these challenging times. We hope you will consider taking a moment to consider a gift for our work with the people of the Sudans and to offer a prayer for their nations. You can contribute online at https://afrecs.org or send a check made out to AFRECS to P.O. Box 3327, Alexandria, VA 22302

Back Issues of this E–Blast remain accessible at www.afrecs.org/News under the heading “E–Blast”.
Specific names, words, and phrases may be located using the “Search” field.

This issue of the AFRECS E–Blast was compiled by Board member Richard Jones.

AFRECS Editors encourage readers to submit their news for publication; Please submit your news to Caroline Klam at klamcd621@gmail.com.

Update from Dane Smith 

Since 2019 AFRECS has been partnering with Five Talents to introduce trauma healing instruction into the activities of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan.  That partnership with the Episcopal Church of South Sudan has been expanded this year from the pilot program in the diocese of Renk to the diocese of Terekeka in Central Equatoria.   In our June 1 issue of this E-Blast we applied to this work the analysis of Bessel Van der Kolk in The Body Keeps the Score, which remains near the top of the New York Times bestseller list.   In this issue we bring you insights of Serene Jones, President of Union Theological Seminary.

In Trauma and Grace: Theology in a Ruptured World, she writes, “Trauma focuses on the effects of violence on our vast interior worlds.”  “Trauma” refers to “events in which one experiences the threat of annihilation.” A traumatic event provokes a sense of “utter helplessness.” These events can happen to individuals and communities, villages and nations, single families and whole regions.  They need not be one-off occurrences but can be repeated events.

Christian faith, however, is in many ways well placed to deal with trauma.

Serene points out, “It’s hard to imagine anywhere in literature or in the annals of human experience a more traumatic event than the torture and execution of this man Jesus, and the event was supported by the whole   surrounding culture. … So, for Christianity, understanding trauma is not just a kind of secondary issue—it is rather the most central event of our faith.

She goes on to say, “Christian faith … inspires a way of life shaped deeply by Biblical stories, rituals and traditions, … telling stories about people becoming agents in their own lives with God-given grace to act.  These stories can reorder the imagination and even the collective imagination of people of faith.”

Given the rapid spread of Christianity in South Sudan, we are seeking to incorporate into our training in Renk and Terekeka Biblical stories and Christian rituals that help traumatized people reorder their imaginations.  Helpful are laments such as the many that people the Book of Psalms — for example “How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever?” (Psalm 13), and community laments such “Lord, you have been our refuge from one generation to another” (Psalm 90).  Scripture can be applied to recovery from rape, e.g., “In you, O LORD, have I taken refuge; let me never be ashamed… You have showed me great troubles and adversities, but you will restore my life and bring me up again from the deep places of the earth. You strengthen me more and more; you enfold me and comfort me”(Psalm 71).

A particularly useful ritual, suggested by the American Bible Society, is called “Taking Your Pain to the Cross.” Participants in a group trauma healing session write down on pieces of paper their worst pains — things done to them, things they observed, even things they did to others.  Then they share them in small group discussion.  They take those pains in prayer or dialogue with Jesus, guided, for example, by Isaiah 53:4-6 (“He was wounded for our transgressions….By his wounds we are healed”).  Finally, the participants take the papers and nail them to the foot of a wooden cross erected at the site of the trauma session.  That ritual was used effectively by the Reverend Sylvester Thomas Kambaya and his brother Ambrose in Mundri in Western Equatoria in 2019.

The need for help with trauma healing is very extensive in South Sudan. AFRECS and Five Talents would like to expand this work to other parts of the country.  If you would like to help, please send your contributions to AFRECS with a note that they should be used for trauma healing. 

Executive Director

Amnesty International Denounces South Sudan’s Repression of Peaceful Protest

Amnesty International has reported that South Sudan is witnessing a “new wave of repression,” targeting freedom of expression, freedom of association, and peaceful assembly.  That statement — and a similar one by Reporters without Borders — followed the suppression of a planned peaceful protest on August 30, when the security forces threatened to use live ammunition.  As a result the streets were empty, and more civic leaders went into hiding. Internet service was interrupted, and Radio Jonglei was closed down. The Sudd Institute think tank, shuttered in August, remains closed.  Shops which did not open August 30 were fined “to pay for the extra security expense.”  On September 3 the Troika governments — US, UK, Norway — plus the European Union called on the Government of South Sudan to protect the rights of citizens.

We pray for Kuel Aguer and all prisoners of conscience

This photograph of the Honorable Kuel Aguer, imprisoned in Juba since August 20, was taken when he was governor of North Bahr al Ghazal state in South Sudan.

Kuel Aguer, a former governor of Northern Bahr al-Ghazal, was arrested in Juba in August after co-signing a protest document by the People’s Coalition for Civil Action. There are reports that his health is deteriorating and he is receiving no medical care, while being held without charges.

O God our Father, whose Son forgave his enemies while he was suffering shame and death: Strengthen those who suffer for the sake of conscience; when they are imprisoned, save them from despair; and to us your servants, give grace to respect their witness and to discern the truth, that our societies may be cleansed and strengthened. This we ask for the sake of Jesus Christ, our merciful and righteous Judge.  Amen.
News Flash:  Aborted Military Coup Attempt September 21 in Khartoum

(From the BBC)

Sudan says that “forces of darkness” linked to the ousted President Omar al-Bashir were behind Tuesday’s failed coup attempt.

“Remnants from the previous regime” were “intent on aborting the civilian democratic transition”, said Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok.

He called it an “orchestrated coup attempt involving elements from both inside and outside the armed forces”.

Reuters news agency quotes the Sudanese military as saying 21 officers and a number of soldiers had been detained in connection with the failed putsch, and they are continuing to search for the rest of the culprits.

Prime Minister Hamdok said his government would “take immediate measures to fortify the transition and continue to dismantle the system of the former regime, which still poses a threat to the transition”.

Diocese of Albany Responds to Disasters in Diocese of Maridi

Tiny St. James Episcopal Church in Au Sable Forks, New York, under the leadership of the Reverend Patricia Johnson, and the Diocese of Albany have been engaged for many years in a Companion Diocese relationship with the Diocese of Maridi in Western Equatoria.   Mother Patti, or “Mama Patti” as she likes to be called, is an oncology nurse who has made eight visits to South Sudan over the past two decades. She also maintains regular internet communication with the former Bishop of Maridi, Justin Badi Arama, and the current bishop. In February of this year, during the dry season, wildfires occurred in five villages in Maridi.  Some 50 families lost over 100 huts and granaries, creating food shortages. A few weeks later the diocesan guest house was destroyed by fire.  The Diocese of Albany mobilized more than $5,500 for repairs of church property, tarpaulins for families impacted, and food supplies, receiving warm thanks from Bishop Moses Zungo.

Mama Patti also reports that the Diocese of Maridi planned to remember Archbishop Joseph Marona, the first Bishop of Maridi, on 18th September.  Bishop Moses sought to honor Archbishop Marona and the relationship he developed with Church Mission Society Ireland, the Diocese of Down and Dromore, and the Diocese of Albany. He invited these three partners to join him on Zoom to talk and pray.

Some Economic and Political Good News

The long delayed session of the South Sudan parliament opened with the convening of 588 lawmakers.  South Sudanese no longer need a passport and visa to travel to Sudan.  They can cross the border with an emergency travel document.  The road from Nimule on the Uganda border to Juba has reopened after truckers went on strike over the killing of drivers by bandits.  The deployment of more regular police patrols has provided some reassurance of safety.  And UNICEF has announced it will provide incentive payments of about $50 to each of 33,000 South Sudanese teachers over the next three months.

Two Movies

From the Sudan Church Review, the magazine of the Church Association for Sudan and South Sudan in the UK (www.cass.org.uk), Spring 2021, come links to two heroic and beautiful documentaries:

Leaving No One Behind                https://spark.adobe.com/page/RSdp2xXMjHKtg/

Tells in vivid photographs and cautious prose the work of women’s groups, subsistence farmers and pastoralists, and grassroots humanitarian agencies which has enabled villages in the Nuba Mountains of the South Kordofan and Blue Nile regions of Sudan to survive during the Covid-19 epidemic of 2020-21 and the continued armed violence. The Episcopal Church in the Dioceses of Kadugli and El-Obeid is part of a “much spoken about humanitarian-development-peace NEXUS, [which] does to a large extent actually exist in practice in Nuba. When activities are designed and implemented by local actors more closely in tune with their communities, the usual distinctions and artificial silos dominating much external aid appear to be more easily overcome.”

Fighting Bombs with Perfume                   https://vimeo.com/109753187

Nagwa Musa Konda says, “When the women come together, sit, and prepare the perfumes or do each other’s hair, they get a chance to talk, to explain their situation, and that gives them a chance also to comfort and encourage one another.

“To me personally these small things are important too. Despite all the challenges, despite all the suffering, I do not want to look messy or walk around smelling bad. I want to be a normal Nuba woman. Therefore I’ll protect my dignity for as long as I’m alive.”

As fall begins, we give thanks for your continued support in prayer and generosity

We are deeply that grateful that contributions from you, our supporters, continue to nurture AFRECS in expanding our impact.  You make a difference in the essential peacebuilding work of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan, so needed in these challenging times. We hope you will consider taking a moment to consider a gift for our work with the people of the Sudans and to offer a prayer for their nations. You can contribute online at https://afrecs.org or send a check made out to AFRECS to P.O. Box 3327, Alexandria, VA 22302

Back Issues of this E-Blast remain accessible at www.afrecs.org/News under the heading “E-Blast”.
Specific names, words, and phrases may be located using the “Search” field.

This issue of the AFRECS E-Blast was compiled by Board member Richard Jones.

AFRECS Editors encourage readers to submit their news for publication; Please submit your news to Caroline Klam at klamcd621@gmail.com.

Directory of Bishops, September 2021

Anglican Province of the Episcopal Church of Sudan

The Most Rev. Ezekiel Kondo,  Primate and Bishop of Khartoum\
ezekialkondo@gmail.com

Rt. Rev. Dr. Fajak Avagani, Assistant Bishop of Khartoum
fajak.ecstd.@gmail.com

Rt. Rev. Ismail Gabriel Abugudin, Bishop of  El Obeid and Dean of Internal Province
ismail.gebreil@gmail.com

Rt. Rev. Saman Farajalla, Bishop of Wad Medani
wadmedani.diocese@gmail.com

Rt. Rev.  Abdu Alnur Kodi, Bishop of Port Sudan
durukaa@live.com

Rt. Rev. Andudu Adam el-Nail, Bishop of Kadugli
bpkadugli@gmail.com

Rt. Rev. Hassan Osman, Assistant Bishop of Kadugli
Hassan.Ojamis@gmail.com

Canon Musa Abujam, Provincial Secretary
msabujam@gmail.com

Update from Dane Smith 

During the past week interaction between Sudan and South Sudan has intensified in a positive way.  Abdalla Hamdok, Transitional Prime Minister of Sudan, visited Juba August 19 for two days of talks with the South Sudan political leadership.  He was accompanied by Foreign Minister Mariam al-Sadiq al-Mahdi, daughter of the late former prime minister, Sadiq al-Mahdi.  Hamdok and President Salva Kiir announced that the border between them would officially open October 1 at four road links, including Renk in South Sudan and Jebeleen on the Sudanese side, the only paved road linking the two countries.  Another objective of the visit, reflecting Hamdok’s role as a member of IGAD, was to encourage the shoring up of the coalition government, recently imperiled by a split in the SPLM/IO party led by Riek Machar.

During the same week it was announced that the Transitional National Legislative Assembly. Would begin business August 24. President Kiir also publicly urged South Sudanese refugees to return home, warning that the elections scheduled for 2024 would not go well without them.

Meanwhile serious inter-communal violence broke out in Warrap State in Bahr al-Ghazal region, and in Tambura in Western Equatoria.  In the north it was violence related to cattle raiding, killing 27 and wounding 29, that pitted Lou Nuer and Thiik against Luach.  In Tambura the mysterious death of a law enforcement officer led to a revenge attack by his community members, killing 20. Two truck drivers were killed on the Juba-Nimule Road August 22, prompting the Kenya Transporters Association to suspend transport of cargo to South Sudan and the South Sudanese Government to send a security team to find the hideout of the killer bandits.

The provision of $12,500 in funding from St. Margaret’s Episcopal in Annapolis MD has led to a spurt of building at the orphan school located at the displaced persons camp outside Juba.  The school is expected to grow from 350 to 500 students this term, utilizing new classrooms and 11 newly selected teachers.

AFRECS recently forwarded $10,000 to help expand its partnership with Five Talents and the Mothers Union in trauma healing instruction.  The program, based on a successful and ongoing pilot program in Renk in Upper Nile, has expanded this year to Terekeka in Central Equatoria.

Finally, more news of Athing Mu, Trenton, New Jersey-born daughter of South Sudan and the 800-meter women’s Olympic champ in Tokyo.  At a major meet in Eugene, Oregon last weekend the 19-year-old set an American record of 1:55.04.

Executive Director

Focus Area: Diaspora

Four people, including two Roman Catholic Nuns are killed in an ambush.

We received sad news from Helen Achol Abyei, a well-known leader of the South Sudanese Diaspora in North America living in St. Louis and a friend of AFRECS. “This tragic (incident) happened in South Sudan. May God her mercy on us: From the Catholic Archdiocese of Juba, we are saddened with the news of the untimely passing on of Sr. Mary Daniel Abul and Sr. Regina Roba, member of the Congregation of the Sacred Heart Sister of the Diocese of Juba after being shot by gunman on Juba Nimule Highway on Monday, August 16.”

Further information was obtained from Radio Tamazuj (08162021) and The Global Sisters Report (08172021)

                          
Sr. Mary Daniel Abut                                   Sr. Regina Roba
(Both photos courtesy of Friends in Solidarity)

At least four people, including two Catholic nuns, were killed in an ambush along the busy Juba-Nimule highway. A convoy of vehicles was returning from Loa Parish of the Catholic Diocese of Torit in Nimule, where Loa Mission Centenary celebrations were held over the weekend. The convoy was attacked as it was making its way to Juba. Major General Daniel Justine, the police spokesperson, confirmed the incident and said security forces were pursuing the attackers.

Special Book Section – Reviews and Recommendations

Sooley by John Grisham
Reviewed by Anita Sanborn, AFRECS Board Member

This is an unexpected novel by one of America best known authors.  John Grisham is a prolific writer who has captivated readers with his smart legal thrillers.  However, in 2021 Grisham surprised us with a beautiful and touching tale which blends two unlikely topics:  refugee life and basketball.  The novel begins in South Sudan in 2016 and follows a young basketball phenom named Samuel Sooleymon.   I already knew quite a bit about the plight of South Sudan, but I learned a lot about basketball reading this book.  Grisham is a basketball fanatic and that is an understatement.  His understanding of the civil strife and complicated warring factions in South Sudan is adequate and he writes with sensitivity and compassion about the 17-year-old Samuel Sooleymon and his family.

Samuel becomes known as Sooley as he begins a new life at North Carolina Central college.  Following the devastating attack on his home village while he was playing in a special tournament in the United States for young players with high potential from around the globe, he is invited to stay.  With his father dead, his only sister abducted and his mother and two brothers in a refugee camp in Uganda, he is thrust into a most lucky situation peopled by well-meaning Americans.

The NBA success of real-life South Sudanese such as Manute Bol makes this tale believable and yet miraculous.  Sooley is a smart and loyal young man who works hard to help his remaining family stay alive until he can bring them to the United States.  I felt deep admiration for his character who reminded me so much of the young men from South Sudanese I have known over the years.  For those of you who have become close to the South Sudanese, this story is full of familiar stories and a mix of immigration difficulties, international NGO heroines, refugee camp woes and the power of faith in building new lives.

Sooley will break your heart.  But for many of us, our hearts have already been broken open by South Sudan.  This is a good book and a great reminder why it is important that we keep the faith with our friends from the Sudans.

Excerpts from A Rope from the Sky: The Making and Unmaking of the World’s Newest State      by Zach Vertin (New York: Pegasus Books, 2019)
Excerpted by Rich Jones, AFRECS Board Member

While working in South Sudan as an analyst for the Crisis Group in 2016, and then again in 2013 while working for Princeton Lyman, U. S. Special Envoy for Sudan and South Sudan, Zack Vertin made friends with a Nuer leader named Rembang Koang. Koang was born in Akobo in 1978 and became a soldier in the youth wing of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army, before diverting to a refugee camp in Kenya. After studying law and project management in Nairobi, he returned home to work for a United Nations program in Malakal. Koang married a Dinka woman from a prominent family and had two children. After the outbreak of violence in Juba in December 2013, Koang, now County Commissioner for Akobo County, refused to return to the capital and was replaced. In 2019 he continued to function as an unofficial, quasi-government leader in the territory contested between Salva Kiir and Riek Machar. This book helped me by combining detailed political analysis with personal encounters.

Vertin writes:

“When the war began in 2013, Koang was attending a meeting in Bor, the state capital, some 150 miles across Jonglei from Akobo.  The army, and the populations, were suddenly fracturing. He worked with government colleagues, both Dinka and Nuer, to try to contain the situation, but the genie had already left the bottle.

“The president ordered Jonglei state officials to report to Juba at once, but Koang had received news of the targeted massacres that had already taken place there. He worried that he might be detained or otherwise neutralized if he went to Juba, and his gut told him to return instead to his Akobo constituency. “I should be where my people are,” he recalls thinking, “so that if I am to make a decision, I do so informed by the feeling of my community.” When a government helicopter arrived from Juba to collect him and the others, Koang did not get on board….

“Koang was torn, and still is…. But Koang was forced to choose.

“’He came under incredible pressure,’ says his former [U.N.] boss and mentor, who spoke with him in the hours before he made the decision. ‘He saw it as a rabbit hole. He saw the stakes and wanted to be part of the solution, not just part of a Nuer-only rebellion.’ But there was no middle ground. Koang met up with Riek Machar’s entourage as it retreated into the Nuer heartland, and he informed Riek that he would join the emergent resistance.

“Adopting a slightly defensive tone, Koang wants me to know just how difficult it was to make that choice. ‘The pastor from my home, Akobo, was among the first killed in Juba,’ he says, adding, ‘killed while wearing his collar. Shot, just like that.’ Koang says he otherwise had no political connection to Riek but asks rhetorically, ‘My own people being killed by the very government that I am representing? I cannot accommodate that.’

“But neither is he comfortable with what happened thereafter in his own community, where fellow Nuer took justice into their own hands by retaliating against innocent Dinkas. ‘Any revenge is inappropriate,’ he says, the frustration evident in his voice. ‘I condemned the killings of Dinka.’

“… After moving our two plastic chairs outside, Koang picks up the conversation again. ‘There are other young people in South Sudan that have influence now in their communities. People who also think things must be done differently.’ He explains that this generation of common minds must find a way to link up. ‘It can be done. But I am here now sitting alone, in Jonglei, thinking about ideas, scratching my mind.’ He continues, scratching his head theatrically. ‘Let me know those in Duk, in Warrap, in Juba, who think like me.’

“‘We need a transformation of all the civil service,’ Koang says. ‘And it needs to be done by people who are wholly blank of the past … neutral’. He rests his elbows on his plastic chair and interlocks his fingers. ‘Technical people in the areas of finance, technical people in the area of judiciary, and so on, and they come and do screening, from the director-general down to the last civil servant.’”

A Sudan Reading List
Compiled by Rich Jones, AFRECS Board Member
1. Andrew S. Natsios, Sudan, South Sudan, & Darfur:  What Everyone Needs to Know
2012, Oxford University Press, 256 pages. Natsios served as USAID Administrator 2001-2005 and US Special Envoy for Sudan 2006-7.

2. Edward Eremugo Kenyi, Sacrifice and other Short Stories
2020, Africa World Books, 133 pages. Kenyi is a public health physician and poet, currently working at Johns Hopkins University; stories are set mostly in South Sudan and Khartoum, with one in Washington, DC and one in outer space.

3. Zack Vertin, A Rope from the Sky: The Making and Unmaking of the World’s Newest State
2019, Pegasus Books, 497 pages.  Vivid descriptions of Sudanese leaders and villagers woven into a coherent chronology of US diplomatic work between 2005 and 2016, as witnessed by a notetaker for the U.S. Special Envoy to Sudan.

4. Francis M. [Mading] Deng, War of Visions: Conflict of Identities in the Sudan
1995, Brookings Institution, 577 pages.  Sociological and historical analysis of ethnic and political background of conflict, 1860-1992, including detail on the Ngok Dinka.

5. John Grisham. Sooley. Doubleday, 2021.

If you have recommendations for other books offering enlightenment on the people or countries of Sudan and South Sudan, please don’t hesitate to forward them to the Editors (Send any contributions to klamcd21@gmail.com).

Other News from Various Sources

Radio Tamazuj   0242021
Civil, political organizations call for resignation of President Kiir and VP Machar

South Sudan activists in anti-government protests. (Photo – Radio Tamazuj)

Groups identifying themselves as non-violent civil and political organizations said in a Joint Communiqué that they held a meeting and resolved to mobilize citizens to demand the resignation of President Salva Kiir Mayardit, First Vice President Dr. Riek Machar Teny, and the RTGoNU.  We, the representatives of the following non-violent civil and political organizations: The People’s Coalition for Civil Action (PCCA), the United Citizens for Change (UCC), National People’s Movement (NPM) and Red Card Movement (RCM), convened a virtual consultative meeting on the situation in our country, the Republic of South Sudan, on 20 August 2021,” the Joint Communiqué dated 20 August read. Earlier this month, The People’s Coalition for Civil Action (PCCA) said plans were afoot for protests against the transitional government across South Sudan and the diaspora and launched a public campaign to demand political change after 10 turbulent and often bloody years of independence.

https://radiotamazuj.org/en/news/article/civil-political-organizations-call-for-resignation-of-president-kiir-and-vp-machar

From The New Humanitarian    08232021
Unpacking South Sudan’s food crisis: Fighting, flooding, and donor fatigue
by Okech Francis and Philip Kleinfeld

South Sudan is experiencing its worst food crisis since independence as seasonal flooding sets in amid an economic downturn and renewed conflict. Efforts to distribute food have been complicated by funding gaps in the humanitarian response, and by the repeated looting of food convoys and warehouses. Attacks against aid workers have also risen, and government officials have created new administrative hurdles for some agencies.

Some 7.2 million people are currently enduring severe hunger across South Sudan – the highest number since the country of roughly 12 million broke from Sudan in 2011. Of those, tens of thousands are thought to be in famine. The government has downplayed the crisis.

Though humanitarian agencies have managed to reach most of those in greatest need this year, aid officials said efforts to raise the alarm at an international level have failed to garner extra resources, leading to ration cuts for those displaced people and refugees who are considered less needy.
https://www.thenewhumanitarian.org/news/2021/8/23/funding-gaps-looting-hinder-south-sudan-food-crisis-response

From Radio Tamazuj  08232021
Poor pay, insecurity affecting education in South Sudan

Many students have stopped going to school due to displacement occasioned by the war and many teachers have abandoned the profession altogether due to safety concerns and lack of or delayed pay.

An elderly lady, Mama Julia John, said that after the outbreak of war in 2013, education declined due to challenges presented by conflict and that many parents, who could afford it, relocated their children and entire families outside the country. Mama Julia said, “When children go to school and at the same time there are sounds of bullets in the locality, automatically parents become unsure about the safety of their children and this fear still exists in many parents.’

An elderly lady, Mama Julia John, said that after the outbreak of war in 2013, education declined due to several challenges presented by conflict and that many parents, who could afford it, relocated their children and entire families outside the country.  Mama Julia said, “When children go to school and at the same time there are sounds of bullets in the locality, automatically parents become unsure about the safety of their children.“

Students in an outdoor classroom. (From Radio Tamazuj)

Professor Ben Tombe says education in South Sudan suffers greatly due to the weakness of the teaching cadre who abandoned the profession because of poor salaries and deplorable working environments.

An activist, Bosco Simi, says improving the education sector requires several interventions starting with improving the pay of teachers, education infrastructure, and training of more teachers. “There is a lot that must be done to improve education; raise teachers’ salaries, improve the school environment, train human resources to provide the best for children, and modernize education,” Simi recommended.

There is no doubt about the importance of education in nation-building and there are many challenges that impede the delivery of education services in various parts of the country due to the recent conflicts. There however remains hope that all these obstacles and challenges will be overcome, and the conditions of teachers and the school environment improved for a better future for all citizens of South Sudan.

https://radiotamazuj.org/en/news/article/poor-pay-insecurity-affecting-education-in-south-sudan

From The East African   08262021
South Sudan deploys team to smoke out criminals on Juba highway
by Garang Malak

South Sudan’s National Police Service Spokesman Gen Daniel Justine said a joint security team, composed of military intelligence and police officers, had been sent out on Monday to track down bandits who have been attacking traffic along the highway between Juba and Nimule.  On Monday, the Kenya Transporters Association (KTA) suspended transporting cargo to South Sudan after two truck drivers were killed 45km from Juba on Sunday evening. A religious group traveling the highway from a celebration of the 100^th anniversary of Loa Parish was attacked and four people including two nuns were killed.

https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/news/east-africa/south-sudan-deploys-team-to-smoke-out-criminals-on-juba-highway-3524362

From Sudans Post    08242021
South Sudan gets $334 million in loan from IMF

The IMF has loaned $334 million (284 million euros) to South Sudan, the country’s central bank governor said Tuesday, as its ailing economy teeters from a currency crisis and soaring inflation. It is the third time in a year the Washington DC-based lender has extended financial aid to the troubled country, which ran out of foreign exchange reserves last year when oil prices fell sharply. The price slump, brought on by the coronavirus pandemic, deprived the fragile government in Juba of much-needed revenue and sent its currency into freefall. Earlier this year, one US dollar was fetching 700 South Sudanese Pounds on the black market – the weakest exchange rate since independence a decade ago.

Central Bank Governor Dier Tong Ngor said the IMF loan would “substantially boost” foreign reserves and allow room to try and recover in the midst of the pandemic. “The increase in reserves will help build external resilience and sustain the current reforms in the foreign exchange market,” Ngor said in a statement seen by AFP.

South Sudan is emerging from five years of civil bloodshed that left 380,000 dead and shattered its economy, which is almost entirely dependent on oil. The government has not been able to pay civil servants on time, while the price of basic goods remains stubbornly high.

https://www.sudanspost.com/south-sudan-gets-334-million-in-loan-from-imf/

From The East African
Sudan, South Sudan to reopen border after 11 years
by Garang Malak

Sudan’s Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok and South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir shake hands after agreeing to reopen the border after 11 years. (Photo by AKUOT CHOL | AFP)

Sudan and South Sudan have agreed to open their borders after 11 years. This was announced after a meeting between South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir and Sudan’s Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok held in Juba.  The border has been closed since South Sudan

The borders were closed in 2011 when relations deteriorated after the south seceded following a long civil war, taking with it three quarters of the country’s oil. This affected traders and communities on both sides of the disputed line.

“The two parties engaged in extensive talks and candid discussion on all aspects and fields of cooperation including the opening of four border crossing posts: Jebeleen-Renk, Meriam, Buram-Tumsah and Kharsana-Panakuac. The official launch will take place on October 1, 2021, by the two parties,” reads the joint press statement.

https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/news/east-africa/sudan-south-sudan-to-reopen-borders-3521412

As the final days of summer move towards fall, we give thanks for your continued support in prayer and generosity

We are deeply that grateful that contributions from you, our supporters, continue to nurture AFRECS in expanding our impact.  You make a difference in the essential peacebuilding work of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan, so needed in these challenging times. We hope you will consider taking a moment to consider a gift for our work with the people of the Sudans and to offer a prayer for their nations. You can contribute online at https://afrecs.org or send a check made out to AFRECS to P.O. Box 3327, Alexandria, VA 22302

This issue of the AFRECS E-Blast was compiled by Board members Caroline Klam and Richard Jones.

AFRECS Editors encourage readers to submit their news for publication; the next deadline is August 31, 2021, please submit your news to Caroline Klam at klamcd21@gmail.com.

Update from Dane Smith 

There is lots of political news out of South Sudan, but it’s a bit hard to assess. The Peoples Coalition for Civil Action issued a declaration July 30 demanding that President Kiir and Vice President Machar step down and urging a non-violent uprising. Three days later the National Security Services arrested one of the signatories, former Northern Bahr al-Ghazal governor Kuel Aguer Kuel, and shut down the Sudd Institute, a Juba-based think tank, with which a second signatory had been associated. The US Embassy called on the Government of South Sudan to respect freedom of speech and assembly and on the security services to respect constitutional guarantees of those rights.

Executive Director

Focus Area: South Sudan:  Educating War Orphans

A young girl stands in front of the temporary shelter where she now lives in a Protection of Civilian Camp (POC) in Juba, South Sudan. Children in the camp along with teachers and administrators are preparing for the start of school in September. [Kate Holt/UNICEF]

Bishop John Gatteck and the teachers and staff of the school in the camp are busy preparing for the new school year. The funds granted by St. Margaret’s Episcopal Church in Annapolis have been received with deep gratitude and are already being employed to complete the construction of new classrooms and other facilities to accommodate 150 additional students in the new school year. This will bring the total student body to five hundred girls and boys in grades 1 through 8.  The expanded enrollment and improved infrastructure will help the school qualify for school supplies and additional support from UNICEF and other non-governmental organizations.

Meanwhile, the school is hiring eleven additional teachers and staff to build capacity for the new students. Over forty applicants have been interviewed and are taking a written exam. In a vacancy announcement, the school is seeking teachers who have some level of teacher training and 2 to 3 years of teaching experience. They want teachers who are self-starters, team players, can work under difficult circumstances and are able to work peacefully with all people. Bishop Gatteck and all of us at AFRECS are excited about expanding this mission to teach and feed more children, most of whom are orphans or unaccompanied minors because of the violence in the country.

Bishop Gatteck continues to request prayers for the school and its staff and students as the new school year opens. Please continue to hold them in your hearts and prayers.

News and Notes

Athing Mu wins 2 Gold Medals
By Dane Smith, AFRECS Executive Director

Athing Mu, of United States, reacts after winning the final of the women’s 800-meters at the 2020 Summer Olympics, Tuesday, Aug. 3, 2021, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek) AP

One of the great stories of the recently concluded Olympics in Japan is the success of Athing Mu.  Born in Trenton, New Jersey, of South Sudanese parents who fled the dictatorship of Omar al-Bashir in the late 1990’s, Athing won two gold medals.  She ran away with the women’s 800-meter race, leading all the way.  She also anchored the American women’s victory in the 4 x 400-meter relay.  Although publicity on the relay focused on Alyson Felix’s 11th medal over five Olympics, Athing actually ran the fastest leg and stood out for her dazzling smile.  The Wall Street Journal’s Rachel Bachman wrote that Athing at 19 may already be the best American female runner.  She is a rising sophomore at Texas A&M.

Human Rights Lawyers, Victims Call for ICC Inquiry on South Sudan
By Ken Scott adapted by Rich Jones, AFRECS Board Member

A prosecutor of war crimes in the former Yugoslavia filed on August 2 a detailed submission with the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court in The Hague, Netherlands, seeking, on behalf of thirty-one South Sudanese victim-survivors and others, an extensive ICC inquiry into atrocities, crimes against humanity, and war crimes in, and concerning, South Sudan and the tragic conflict that commenced in December 2013.

Kenneth R. Scott, a former U.S. Assistant District Attorney in Denver, Colorado, was joined in his submission by Guernica 37, a law group providing pro bono technical services in London, Madrid, and San Francisco. “There is a legal and evidential basis for opening a preliminary examination in relation to the situation in South Sudan,” Guernica 37’s Toby Cadman said. “In a conflict which has lasted more than six years and has seen more than a million and a half civilians take refuge across international borders and more than two million internally displaced, there is a demand that victims see justice.”

The confidential submission is supported by thirty-one victim-survivors, all South Sudanese women, almost all of whom were raped or sexually assaulted in connection with their displacement, all of whom have provided their heart-wrenching stories. Many men were killed or disappeared, as entire families and communities were displaced and homes destroyed, generally along ethnic or tribal lines. “Witnesses are more than willing to tell their stories”, Scott said. “They just have to be asked.”

The detailed 108-page submission asks the ICC Prosecutor to examine the massive deportation of more than one million South Sudanese into northern Uganda as a crime against humanity, as well as the war crime of ordering the displacement of a civilian population, and other related and connected crimes, including widespread killing and sexual violence.

An essential basis for the ICC’s engagement concerning South Sudan is the ICC’s jurisdictional decisions on human rights violations and crimes concerning Myanmar, which, like South Sudan, is not an ICC State-Party. The ICC determined that it has jurisdiction over Myanmar-related crimes where some part of the crimes (including, for some crimes, their consequences, or effects) were committed, occurred, or completed on the territory of an ICC State-Party — in that case, Bangladesh. Based on deportation and persecution as crimes against humanity — at least some parts of which were committed, continued or completed in Bangladesh — the ICC’s Pre-Trial Chamber III authorized the ICC Prosecutor to open a full investigation concerning Myanmar crimes which, once authorized, was, and is, not limited to the crimes examined in the preliminary investigation.

“A dramatically similar jurisdictional analysis applies to South Sudan and Uganda,” said Scott. “Crimes against humanity and horrible war crimes have been committed, and excuse after excuse, delay after delay, impunity after impunity cannot be tolerated.”

The Feast of Marc Nikkel
by Rich Jones, AFRECS Board Member

The Rev. Dr. Marc Nikkel and Akurdit
Photo by Nancy M. Frank, first AFRECS Executive Director

The Rev. Dr. Marc R. Nikkel (1950-2000), a native of Reedley, California, was a missionary of The Episcopal Church and the Church Mission Society of the U.K. who dedicated his life and ministry to the people of Sudan. He is remembered there as an evangelist and teacher who was instrumental in the rapid spread of Christian faith during the 1980’s and 1990’s and as a peacemaker among the more than sixty ethnic groups in what is today South Sudan. A school was established in his memory in Bor Diocese.

Among the many dioceses and parishes in the United States touched by the preaching and writing of Marc Nikkel, Grace Episcopal Church (the former R. E. Lee Memorial Church) in the college town of Lexington, Virginia, for the past twenty years has celebrated this lesser, latter-day saint annually on the Sunday closest to his death – this year it will be September 5. The preacher will be Peter Alier, a lay leader of the Sudanese congregation meeting at St. James Episcopal Church in Roanoke, Virginia. Richard J. Jones, retired professor of mission at Virginia Theological Seminary, will speak on “Being Christian in the Two Sudans Today.” As a resource to anyone interested in learning more, or in celebrating this missionary life in your own community, AFRECS offers these liturgical materials and background reading.

The Collect and Readings for the Feast of Mark Nikkel

Lord God, giver of all gifts, we bless your name for the gifts of missionary zeal, courage in the face of adversity and suffering, and scholarly achievement on behalf of the Episcopal Church of Sudan given through Marc Nikkel, missionary priest. We pray that your Holy Spirit may continue to provide, through your Church, people with strength in adversity, articulate faith in the midst of suffering, and dedication to the ministry of peace and reconciliation. We ask this for your glory and the strengthening of your Church, through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.

The First Lesson—Lamentations 3:22-26 (The Lord is good to those who wait for him)
Psalm 96 (Sing to the LORD a new song)
The Second Lesson—Philippians 4:4-9 (The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding)
The Gospel—Matthew 5:1-16 (Blessed are the peacemakers)

Sudan Reading List and Resources
1. Marc Nikkel, Why Haven’t You Left? Letters from the Sudan Edited by Grant LeMarquand. 2006, Church Publishing. Candid, personal, and descriptive record of a learner and a teacher in a time of war.
2. Andrew S. Natsios, Sudan, South Sudan, & Darfur: What Everyone Needs to Know; 2012, Oxford University Press, 256 pages. Natsios served as USAID Administrator 2001-2005 and US Special Envoy for Sudan 2006-7.
3.. Edward Eremugo Kenyi, Sacrifice and other Short Stories; 2020, Africa World Books, 133 pages. Kenyi is a public health physician and poet, currently working at Johns Hopkins University; stories are set mostly in South Sudan and Khartoum, with one in Washington, DC and one in outer space.
4. Zack Vertin, A Rope from the Sky: The Making and Unmaking of the World’s Newest State; 2019, Pegasus Books, 497 pages. Vivid descriptions of Sudanese leaders and villagers woven into a coherent chronology of US diplomatic work between 2005 and 2016, as witnessed by a notetaker for the U.S. Special Envoy to Sudan.
5. Francis M. Deng, War of Visions: Conflict of Identities in the Sudan; 1995, Brookings Institution, 577 pages. Sociological and historical analysis of ethnic and political background of conflict, 1860-1992, including detail on the Ngok Dinka.

A Prayer for Sudan and South Sudan  https://afrecs.org/pray/

Holy Women, Holy Men: May 16: The Martyrs of the Sudan
https://standingcommissiononliturgyandmusic.org/2011/05/16/may-16-the-martyrs-of-the-sudan/
Contact: mathewsonl@stpaulcathedral.org

Friends on Other Islands
by Rich Jones, AFRECS Board Member

American friends of the Episcopal Church of the Sudans appreciate being reminded we are part of an international network. Our Executive Director recently received a note from Jenny Smyth in Belfast, where she is mission director of Church Mission Society Ireland. She wrote,

“I just wanted to thank you for the very informative and carefully curated E-blast updates. These are very helpful for us here in Church Mission Society Ireland giving a wider perspective on the geopolitical situation as it unfolds. We keep in close contact with the specific ECSS partners we work with (dioceses of Kajo Keji, Yei, Maridi, Olo, Ibba) and value the contribution AFRECS makes in both practical support and information sharing. “

Prompted by this kind message to look at CMSI’s bulletin from April 2021 edited by Linda Abwa (South Sudan Update APR21 (filesusr.com) , we found news of leaders we knew and calamities and blessings in South Sudan we had no inkling of.

We are grateful for the labor of Archdeacon A. Paul Fehley over the past year and a half in Toronto, Canada. Paul skillfully used his position as Interim Africa Partnership Officer for The Episcopal Church to convene three useful teleconferences. Americans benefitted from hearing the voices of Canon Ian Woodward of the Diocese of Salisbury in the Church of England, Bishop Anthony Poggo at Lambeth Palace in London, Dr. Joseph Z. Bilal in Juba, and Nagulan Nisia, Africa staff member for Episcopal Relief and Development.

The oldest foreign friends of the ECS and ECSS are undoubtedly the Church Mission Society in the U.K., active in Sudan from 1899 onward, and the Church Association for Sudan and South Sudan. (The latter began with a core of concerned former colonial administrators and missionaries from the era before Sudanese independence in 1956.) The Association’s excellent website is www.casss.org.uk. Their Co-Chair is the Rev. Pauline Walker, a longtime encourager of theological education in the Sudans.

AFRECS lacks contact with CMS in Australia, where many expatriated Sudanese have settled, and which is a significant supporter of the church in the Sudans. (Help wanted!)

The Apostle to the Gentiles, St. Paul, of course, had already told us: “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the harvest.”

Other News from Various Sources

From Sudan Tribune   August 10, 2021
US Urges SS leaders to protect fundamental rights

August 10, 2021 (JUBA)- The United States on Tuesday said it supported South Sudan’s independence in order for the landlocked East African nation to become a fully united, peaceful, just, and prosperous society based on respect for human rights and the rule of law. In a statement released by the Embassy in Juba (https://ss.usembassy.gov/civil-rights-are-essential-to-achieving-peace-and-prosperity/),  The U.S embassy’s statement comes days after authorities arrested former Northern Bahr El Ghazal state governor for signing a document calling on the public to hold the South Sudanese government accountable to the citizens. Other signatories to the document have since gone into hiding for fear of similar arrests.

https://www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article69930

From Radio Tamazuj
Sudan to hand Bashir, other officials to ICC

Sudan says it will surrender former officials, including former deposed president Omar al-Bashir, wanted for alleged war crimes in the Darfur region to the International Criminal Court (ICC).

Mariam al-Mahdi, Sudan’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, was quoted as saying “The Council of Ministers decided to hand over those wanted by the ICC and approved a bill on Sudan’s accession to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, and the two matters will be presented in a joint meeting of the Sovereignty Council and the Council of Ministers for ratification,”

According to the official SUNA agency, the minister made the remarks on Tuesday during a consultative meeting between the foreign ministry and the new chief prosecutor of the Hague-based court, Karim Khan, who was visiting Khartoum.
Al-Bashir ruled Sudan for 30 years. The military overthrew Al-Bashir in April 2019 amid nationwide protests, and he faces charges of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity over the conflict that broke out in Darfur in 2003.

https://radiotamazuj.org/en/news/article/sudan-to-hand-bashir-other-officials-to-icc-suna

As our friends in the Sudans struggle to build peace in their nations, we give thanks for your continued support in prayer and generosity

We are deeply that grateful that contributions from you, our supporters, continue to nurture AFRECS in expanding our impact.  You make a difference in the essential peacebuilding work of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan, so needed in these challenging times. We hope you will consider taking a moment to consider a gift for our work with the people of the Sudans and to offer a prayer for their nations. You can contribute online at https://afrecs.org or send a check made out to AFRECS to P.O. Box 3327, Alexandria, VA 22302

This issue of the AFRECS E-Blast was compiled by Board members Caroline Klam and Richard Jones.

AFRECS Editors encourage readers to submit their news for publication; the next deadline is August 17, 2021, please submit your news to Caroline Klam at klamcd21@gmail.com.

Update from Dane Smith 

South Sudan. Negotiations in Rome under the auspices of Sant’Egidio, the lay Catholic peacebuilding organization, have made further progress toward bringing the forces of Pagan Amum (Real SPLM) and Gen. Paul Malong (South Sudan United Front) into the R/ARCSS peace agreement. They signed a Memorandum of Understanding committing to enter the 2017 Ceasefire Verification Mechanism and to an agenda for further talks under Sant’Egidio.  The other major holdout, Gen. Thomas Cirillo, leader of the National Salvation Front (NSF), is not as far along as the others but has said he will join the ceasefire mechanism when NSF recommits to the 2017 Cessation of Hostilities Agreement in upcoming negotiations.

In other news the Troika (governments of US, UK, and Norway) has rebuked the South Sudanese Government for the shutdown by security forces of a July 17 civil society discussion of the constitutional history of South Sudan, held under the auspices of the South Sudan Civil Society Forum.  The Troika called for freedom of assembly and termed necessary an open and inclusive constitution-making process.  UN Mission Chief Nicholas Haysom noted July 26 that 42 people accused of criminal activity had been executed this year without a fair trial.  He said he was deeply concerned about this spate of extra-judicial executions.

Sudan. There is continuing burgeoning displacement in West Darfur, where fighting continues between the Masalit and Arab groups.  There are reportedly more than 80 camps of displaced people. The number of displaced (hundreds of thousands) has grown rapidly in the wake of the gradual withdrawal since December of the UN peace force (UNAMID).  UN forces are supposed to be replaced by 20,000 Sudanese troops, but that has not yet happened.

Francis Deng’s Wisdom. I would like to call our readers’ attention to the article this month by Francis M. Deng, one of South Sudan’s most distinguished citizens, on the 10th anniversary of the country’s independence.  Before independence he served as Sudan’s ambassador to the US and Canada, and later as the UN Special Rapporteur on Displaced Persons (1992-2004) and UN Special Advisor on Genocide (2007-2012).  After independence he was South Sudan’s first ambassador to the UN.  He is the author of 40 books on international affairs and two novels about Sudan.

His article highlights three themes:  the interplay in South Sudan of internal and external forces; the post-independence crises a power struggle between leaders and their associates led to the relative neglect of the rest of the country; and the need for collaborative efforts of the South Sudanese with international partners.  He argues, “We must prioritize taking peace to the countryside to end inter-communal violence, ensure the security of rural areas, encourage people to return to their villages, and give them essential … tools … to generate self-reliant development. … Well-grounded strategic optimism must be the only way forward.”  To see the entire article, visit “Clearing the Dimming Vision of the Liberation of South Sudan,” https://suddinstitute.org

The Nubans.  On a slightly lighter side, take a look at the article below on the Nuba people of Sudan and their attachment to secularism — an article which begins with a sketch on wrestling.  During my time in Sudan in the 1980s, a particular Saturday pleasure was to watch Nuba wrestling in an open area outside Khartoum.  Those weekly contests are still going on.  Nubans, who originate from the Nuba Mountains of South Kordofan (and should not be confused with Nubians), are now well represented in major cities in Sudan.  Nubans are both Christian and Muslim, but aside from the Copts, they constitute the largest group of Sudanese Christians.

In addition to the congregations of the Episcopal Dioceses of Kadugli and El-Obeid, Nubans today also belong to Episcopal congregations in Port Sudan, Wad Medani, and Khartoum.

Executive Director

News and Notes

The Rev. Bob North’s 60 year “Journey” to South Sudan

The Rev. Robert North (from the Mirror Democrat)

Father Bob North’s “journey” to South Sudan began over 60 years ago with a three-month college study trip to Africa.  Almost 50 years later, Father Bob and his wife Karen made plans to return to Africa following an invitation from the bishop of the new Diocese of Nzara in South Sudan.  Bishop Samuel Peni (now Archbishop) invited them to help bring to reality the vision for the newly formed diocese.  Bishop Peni had spent the first year of the diocese working with the clergy and people in prayer to map out where they believed God was leading them – their call for the early years was evangelism, health, and education.  With the support of his parish, Grace Church, Galena, Illinois and other gifts he and Karen prepared to leave for a year in Nzara, bringing with them donations of $75,000 raised for their work.  In that first year, which extended to two with the help of the national church and the grace of their parish, they purchased motorcycles for the diocesan staff, a used dump truck, various supplies and equipment including two cement block makers!  Karen soon began teaching English and Bob became a building contractor, designing the buildings, buying the supplies, and supervising volunteers from the diocese in the construction of a Diocesan Center with 4 offices, a Conference Center, four health clinics, a computer center, and pre-school which grew into a full primary school.  From the perspective of a few years, Father Bob now says, “Never did I imagine that as a missionary I would primarily end up building things.  I had always imagined myself teaching in an overseas seminary or college.’

After two years in Nzara, Father Bob and Karen returned to the U.S., but continued work in fundraising for various projects in Nzara.  In 2019, with the help of funds from the United Thank Offering (UTO) and various Episcopal churches and donors, a new Birthing Center was built at the main health clinic in Nzara providing room for mothers to deliver in safety with the help of certified Midwives and Birthing Assistants.  In addition, they provided bicycles so the staff can make prenatal visits, and 4 additional classrooms each for the preschool and primary schools.

Midwives and Traditional Birthing Attendants with new bicycles provided
by the United Thank Offering of The Episcopal Church in front of the new Birthing Center.

The Norths have hosted both Bishop Peni and his successor, Bishop Richard Aquilla, when they visited St. Mark’s Church, Maquoketa, Iowa where Fr. North now serves. The Diocese of Iowa has twice given Fr. Bob the opportunity to return to Nzara.  On each of these trips he has renewed his deep bonds with the bishops, diocesan staffs, and the many clergy and laypersons whom he and Karen met during their initial service.  These relationships are ultimately what diocesan companionship is all about.  Fr. Bob says, “I count it a privilege to have once been summoned by the drums to go to the Nzara Cathedral each morning for prayers, to sing the hymns in Zande, and to have preached from the cathedral’s pulpit on numerous occasions. What a joy it is to see familiar faces, to hear and watch the various cathedral choirs sing and dance, and to celebrate the American Book of Common Prayer service, which is used at the English service every Sunday.”

A journey that began over sixty years ago, and that became more narrowly focused ten years ago, has borne great fruit in furthering God’s work in a remote corner of God’s world.

Other News from Various Sources

From PRI World News   July 21, 2021
After the revolution, a secular Sudan?
By Halima Gikandi

The Nuba rebels of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N) are negotiating with the transitional government, and reviving an age-old issue in Sudan: secularism, or the separation between religion and the state.

It’s more than 100 degrees in Khartoum, but that hasn’t stopped hundreds of people from gathering in an open field to watch athletes wrestle each other to the sandy ground. Many of the young wrestlers, and the audience for that matter, come from the Nuba Mountains, where this style of wrestling originates.

Wrestlers circle each other at a match in Khartoum, Sudan. Credit: Halima Gikandi/The World

“Those people ruled us for 30 years in the name of religion, in the name of Islam,” said Mansoor Dawood, a Muslim wrestler from Nuba.

The Nuba Mountains in Sudan’s South Kordofan region is made up of predominantly Black African tribes who are religiously diverse — consisting of Christians, Muslims, and animists alike. Mixed families are common. For years, Nuba rebels fought against the aggressive regime of former President Omar al-Bashir, which pushed a strict Islamic and Arab version onto a diverse country. In 1993, he declared a holy war (jihad) against the region — calling them enemies to Muslims and Arabs. But the 2019 uprising that saw Bashir removed from power has brought a chance for peace.

“As a guy from [the] Nuba Mountains, I support that,” Dawood said. “We need secularism in Sudan, so we can get out of that nonsense,” he added, referring to the violent military campaign against the Nuba. Earlier this year, the government and SPLM-N signed a principles agreement, declaring that Sudan has no state religion.

The policies of the previous regime under Bashir claiming that the majority are Muslim in Sudan, and therefore, the governing system should be based on Islam created problems not only with the people of the Nuba Mountains. The consequences of these policies, which failed to account for Sudan’s diversity, came to a head 10 years ago, when Christians in the south voted to secede and form South Sudan.

Many people from Nuba fear there’s a risk of other parts of the country breaking away, or of ongoing conflict, if Sudan is not able to take religious ideology out of government affairs. On the other hand, many Muslims in Sudan are wary of secularization and think the pace of change is too fast.

People gathered for Friday prayers at the Grand Mosque in Khartoum, Sudan. Credit: Mohamed Noureldin Abdallah/The World

Any issue regarding the future direction of the country should be left to a government mandated by the people,” said Professor Hassan Elhaj Ali Ahmed, political scientist at the University of Khartoum. He argued that the transitional government is going down a slippery slope by trying to “de-Islamicize” the country so quickly and he warns that if the government makes too many changes on social and identity issues, they risk a backlash from religious conservatives.

From The Washington Post   July 25, 2021
By James Ellingworth
Sudan, South Sudan athletes on Refugee team at Tokyo Olympics

The IOC Olympic Refugee Team march in the opening ceremony at the Tokyo Olympics 2021. From Twitter @Olympics

The Refugee Olympic Team was created by the International Olympic Committee for the 2016 Olympics to allow athletes to keep competing even if they have been forced to leave their home countries. Both South Sudan with 4 athletes and Sudan with 1 athlete are represented on the 2021 Refugee Olympic Team.  Both countries are also represented by their own Olympic Committees with 5 athletes from Sudan competing in Track and Field, Judo, Rowing and Swimming: and 2 athletes from South Sudan both competing in Track and Field.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/olympics/explainer-how-team-of-refugee-athletes-made-it-to-olympics/2021/07/25/79430af0-ed18-11eb-a2ba-3be31d349258_story.html

From Eye Radio   July 20, 2021
By Charles Wote
From Radio Tamazuj   July 27, 2021
Deep concerns arise over increased violence in Western Equatoria

Violent attacks on villagers and the residence of a traditional local chief in the new Western Equatoria State preceded the expected arrival July 25 in Yambio, the capital, of a newly appointed Governor, General Alfred Futuyo Karaba, a nominee of the Sudan Peoples Liberation Movement in Opposition. The new Governor speaks Balanda, while the majority of Western Equatoria residents speak Zande. A meeting of military commanders convened in Juba by First Vice-President Riek Machar had ordered that SPLM-IO forces in Western Equatoria should be relocated and integrated with South Sudan Defense Forces. Various government mediators have been convening community meetings to address the grievances and suffering of thousands of civilians displaced by armed men from Tambura and other towns. Speaking of the worsening situation on behalf of an interchurch council, Archbishop Samuel Peni of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan called on political leaders to avoid “irresponsible comments and incitement”.   He added, “As the church, we are raising this concern to our state government, to our national government, so they can address this matter. People are just being killed.”
https://eyeradio.org/clerics-deeply-concerned-by-atrocities-in-tambura-urged-govt-to-intervene/
https://radiotamazuj.org/en/news/article/tambura-unrest-more-than-4-000-people-displaced-by-fresh-attacks

From Anadolu Agency   July 19, 2021
By Benjamin Takpiny
South Sudan runs out of COVID-19 Vaccine

Health authorities in South Sudan said that the country has run out of COVID-19 vaccines after exhausting the supply of AstraZeneca doses it received from the COVAX facility in March this year. John Rumunu, director-general for preventive health services in the Ministry of Health, said they have officially ended vaccinations across the country. He said South Sudan has vaccinated 56,989 people since the country launched its vaccination campaign. South Sudan has so far reported 10,959 infections and 117 deaths.
https://www.aa.com.tr/en/africa/south-sudan-runs-out-of-covid-19-vaccines/2308488

From Eye Radio   July 26, 2021
By Jale Richard
From Sudans Post   July 27, 2021
Insecurity, fragile political situation top UN’s election assessment report

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres [Photo by Fiona Goodall/Getty Images]

In a report submitted to the UN Security Council on July 16, Antonio Guterres, the Secretary-General of the United Nations, released the needs assessment for elections in South Sudan, highlighting the need for progress in security, and legal framework before elections are held.
He raised concerns over a fragile security situation and a challenging political and socio-economic environment that he says tempers the aspirations for peaceful and credible elections.  He indicated that South Sudan will – from now – need two more years beyond the timeline provided for in the revitalized peace agreement, to conduct credible, free, and fair elections.

The report states, “Electoral operations in South Sudan will be extremely complex and lengthy, given the infrastructure challenges, security concerns, inability to access large parts of the country during the rainy season, illiteracy rate and difficulty for many South Sudanese to prove their age and citizenship.”

“The parties to the peace process will likely rely on the assistance of the United Nations, the African Union, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development, the Troika (the United States of America, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and Norway), the European Union and others to move forward,” it adds, before saying, “The ongoing cooperation to support the implementation of the peace agreement will assume even greater importance in the context of elections.”
(Link to the full UN report: https://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/S_2021_661_E.pdf)
https://eyeradio.org/insecurity-fragile-political-situation-top-uns-election-assessment-report-for-s-sudan/
https://eyeradio.org/insecurity-fragile-political-situation-top-uns-election-assessment-report-for-s-sudan/

From The Washington Post and the Associated Press   July 22, 2021
For South Sudan mothers, COVID-19 shook a fragile foundation

Paska Itwari Beda, the young mother of five children, is on the phone at her Juba, South Sudan home. (AP Photo/Adrienne Surprenant)

Paska Itwari Beda knows hunger all too well. The young mother of five children — all of them under age 10 — sometimes survives on one bowl of porridge a day, and her entire family is lucky to scrape together a single daily meal, even with much of the money Beda makes cleaning offices going toward food

In South Sudan, lives are built and teeter on the edge of uncertainty. A peace deal to end the civil war lags far behind schedule. Hunger haunts more than half the population of 12 million people

Yet many women say it’s the pain of the pandemic they feel most — a slow-moving disaster, in contrast to the sudden trauma of war and its fallout of famine — as they try to hold families together in what is already one of the world’s most difficult places to raise children.

With COVID-19 came the shrinking of humanitarian aid, a lifeline for many in South Sudan, as faraway donors turned attention and funding toward their own citizens instead. A lockdown wiped out the informal, untaxed labor and other work that many South Sudanese relied on for their daily meal.

Beda’s husband, a teacher who had long supported the family with his steady salary — abruptly stopped getting a paycheck. Beda’s family, like many in South Sudan, was suddenly without its breadwinner.

Beda wants more for her children than she had for herself. She witnessed five years of civil war that killed an estimated 400,000 people. She never finished her schooling, instead becoming pregnant with her first child. Beda is determined that her children will have more.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/for-south-sudan-mothers-covid-19-shook-a-fragile-foundation/2021/07/22/316527c4-eab4-11eb-a2ba-3be31d349258_story.html

As we move through the beauty of summer, we thank you for continuing to remember our friends in the Sudans!

We are deeply that grateful that contributions from you, our supporters, continue to nurture AFRECS in expanding our impact.  You make a difference in the essential peacebuilding work of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan.  We hope you will consider taking a few minutes from your summer activities to consider a gift to the struggling people of the Sudans — of whatever you can afford in this time of COVID and increasing disruption. You can contribute online at https://afrecs.org or send a check made out to AFRECS to P.O. Box 3327, Alexandria, VA 22302

This issue of the AFRECS E-Blast was compiled by Board members Caroline Klam and Richard Jones.

AFRECS Editors encourage readers to submit their news for publication; the next deadline is August 3, 2021, please submit your news to Caroline Klam at klamcd21@gmail.com.