Kiir replaces Northern Bahr el Ghazal governor with brother of ex-army chief

JUBA – South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir Mayardit issued a decree on Monday night replacing the governor of Northern Bahr el Ghazal State, Tong Akeen Ngor, and the national minister of trade and industry, Kuol Anyuon Kuol.

In the decree, read out on state-owned South Sudan Broadcasting Corporation (SSBC), Kiir appointed Simon Uber Ajonga Mawut as the new governor of Northern Bahr el Ghazal State and Joseph Muom Majak as the new minister of trade and industry.

Ngor, who hails from Mayom Wel Payam in Aweil East County, previously served as a member of national parliament in Sudan, which he was appointed to on the ticket of the National Congress Party (NCP) in 2005.

Defeated in the 2010 Sudanese general elections, he did not hold any senior government role until his appointment as governor of the defunct Aweil State in 2019. He joined the SPLM in 2016, three years before his appointment.

Following the return of South Sudan to ten states in February 2020, Ngor was appointed as the governor of Northern Bahr el Ghazal. He is one of the longest serving governors in South Sudan.

Mawut, the new governor, is from Bar Mayen Payam in Aweil Center County and is the younger brother of former South Sudan army chief, James Ajonga Mawut, who died while receiving treatment in Egypt in April 2018.

His appointment marks the first time someone from Aweil Center County has held this position in the post-independence South Sudan.

In a separate decree, Kiir dismissed the national minister of trade and industry, Kuol Anyuon Kuol, and appointed Joseph Muom Majak. Anyuon had been appointed to the position late last year.

The new trade minister Muom, previously the ambassador of South Sudan to Egypt, sparked controversy in 2022 after ordering Egyptian police to beat and deport protesting students on government scholarship.

The students had occupied the South Sudan embassy for a week after the Egyptian universities allegedly demanded tuition fees which the students said were not aware off when applying for the scholarship.

Kiir did not provide reasons for the replacements, citing only his powers under the transitional constitution of 2011 and the revitalized peace agreement, known as R-ARCISS.