Critic questions neutrality of government-hired water experts  

JUBA – A South Sudan presidency critic on Sunday questioned as to whether government-hired water experts would be neutral in their public lecture on the government project to dredge the Naam River and other Nile River tributaries.

On Friday, South Sudan government information minister and spokesman Michael Makuei Lueth announced that at least three water experts from the Oxford University, Canada, and the United States would be arriving in Juba to give a public lecture on water management.

The government which previously seems undecided on the decision to dredge Nile River tributaries of weeds impeding water flow has recent came out to public announce that the dredging of rivers in the country was a government policy and approved by the council of ministers.

“It is also agreed that a team of experts will be arriving. One expert will be from Oxford [University], the other will be coming from Canada, and another from the United States of America. These are experts on water resources management. They would come and give us lectures on all these. This is in addition to our local experts,” he said.

“So these people will be arriving on the 13th to brief everybody including the cabinet, the public and the parliament on this issue so that we can start putting it to an end,” the senior government official further added.

In reaction, Activist Wani Michael, a prominent J1 critic, said there is no doubt that the experts will not give neutral views regarding the river dredging initiative because they are allegedly hired by a government with the aim to make a friendly position to the official government stance.

“The so called experts were hired by the same government that has already made up its mind or decision known to the public. They’ve publicly made it abundantly CLEAR that the dredging of our waters and the digging of the Jonglei Canal is a government project or policy,” Michael said.

“Am here wondering what sort of neutrality these so called experts will bring on board when they’re already hired under clear terms and a decided issue by the government against its people,” he added.

He warned citizens not to “be fooled by this government that now wants to use the so called experts to convince us and do the PR for them. Our own South Sudanese experts opposed to the projects but as usual government listen so much to outsiders than their own.”