Since 2013, South Sudan has collapsed into civil war, with widespread insecurity. Tens of thousands of people have been killed, and millions are displaced and in need of humanitarian support. A 2018 study indicated roughly 400,000 South Sudanese have been killed as a result of the breakout of war since 2013, causing 1.7 million people to be internally displaced and 2.5 million people to flee as refugees into neighbouring countries. Nearly half the population are severely food insecure and access to basic services continues to severely decline due to conflict and poor governance. South Sudan is one of the most dangerous places in the world to be a woman or girl with an estimated 65% of women and girls experiencing physical or sexual violence. An estimated 40% of people are traumatized by the recent and historic violence with an estimated 900,000 children needing psychological support.
Even though a peace agreement was signed in September 2018, many people remembered the conflict relapses in the past after negotiated peace. Some people felt that within months fighting would be back on. However, 2019 turned out to be a relatively peaceful year. Still, peace building needs to be a continuous movement to promote and sustain other long term development initiatives.
Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 16 and the UN Sustaining Peace resolutions highlight the importance of ensuring responsive, inclusive, participatory and representative decision-making at all levels as well as the substantial role of civil society in sustaining peace.
SSGID believes that true peace will not come to South Sudan not merely through a top-down, negotiated agreement by political leaders, but rather in an environment where citizens can wield collective power to press for reforms that will foster peace. At the local level, Peace Committees and Peace Clubs need to be further empowered to help communities determine what peace can look like and find multiple pathways to achieving that peace.
Within this context, our approach to peace building and conflict mitigation is as follows:
- Working with local communities through addressing the underlying causes of conflicts and building meaningful peace.
- Organizing regular community dialogues and peace festivals as a means of addressing early signs of conflicts and prevention of conflicts.
- Extension of psychosocial support
- Promotion of inter-community dialogue
- Promotion of reconciliation among the communities
- Peace forum and conference
- Peace education
- Peace dialogue community consultation
- Dialogue & Negotiation
- Mediation & Arbitration