By Deng Machol, JUBA South Sudan
Many of South Sudan’s civil
servants have not been paid for months as the government has run out of funds,
with income from oil exports allocated to servicing loans until 2027, the
finance minister and affected workers said.President Salva Kiir
Government employees demanding
salary arrears include members of the security forces, doctors and nurses, according
to Finance Minister Agak Achuil.
“The reason why we are not
paying the arrears is that the oil money is going towards the payment of loans
which have been taken before and paying for some of the priorities of the
government,” he told reporters in Juba, the capital. “Where am I going to get
the money if the oil has been sold in advance up to 2027?”
The government will allocate
oil sales for 2028 and beyond in order to pay salaries for this year, he said.
The finance ministry recently
paid the November and December salaries but now owes for the first four months
of 2022.
President Salva Kiir’s
government depends on oil proceeds to pay salaries and finance other
development projects. Internal revenue sources are not enough to support government
expenditure.
But the government has
borrowed heavily against the country’s oil exports. In 2019 authorities agreed
to allocate 10,000 barrels of crude oil per day as payment to Chinese firms
building roads in the country.
Some spending is seen as
profligate. A decision in 2018 to give each of the country’s 400 legislators a
$40,000 loan to buy personal cars was widely criticized in a country where most
government employees live in relative poverty. Medical workers are among the
least paid, with most nurses and midwives earning under $100 per month.
Some government employees who
spoke to The Associated Press said they are finding it hard to look after their
families amid rising commodity prices in Juba and elsewhere.
“Food is expensive and
children are stressing us for school fees,” said a government office messenger,
Tereza Akol. “Our situation is bad.”
Akol said she hasn’t received
a payment since January.
Mary Poni, who works as a
cleaner in a government office, said she now has a side job as a vegetable
seller in order to put food on the table. “How can you serve a government which
doesn’t care about you?” she said.
Kiir last year directed
finance authorities to allocate 5,000 barrels of crude oil per day to
regularize salary payments, but that has not yet been implemented.
South Sudan produces 3.5
billion barrels of oil annually. Monthly oil earnings of roughly $57 million
cover just a fraction of the government’s monthly expenditure of $200 million,
according to official figures.
Achuil, the finance minister,
gave no details about government debt when he spoke last week.
Some government critics accuse
the government of taking corrupt loans as many are finalized without
parliamentary approval.
“These loans are very corrupt
because there (is) lots of money being exchanged under the table,” said Peter
B. Ajak, an economist who previously worked for the government. “This is why
money of five years is already spent.”
There were high hopes for
peace and stability in South Sudan when the country gained its long-fought
independence from Sudan in 2011. But the country slid into civil war in
December 2013 largely based on ethnic divisions when forces loyal to Kiir battled
those loyal to his deputy president, Riek Machar.
Tens of thousands of people
were killed in the civil conflict which ended with a 2018 peace agreement that
brought Kiir and Machar back together in a government of national unity.
But South Sudan’s oil
production has not yet recovered fully. - AP
No comments:
Post a Comment