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LAND GRABBING IN SOUTH SUDAN

COUNTRY PROFILE

South Sudan is located in the central region of Africa and has an area of 644,329 square

kilometres and is the home of 64 ethnic groups. It seceded from Sudan and became an

independent state on 9 July 2011. This country is imbued with enormous deposits of petroleum

and many other natural resources, including fertile land, a long section of the White Nile and a

swampy area that covers one of the world's largest wetlands and the largest freshwater wetland in

the Nile basin. Despite all this human and natural richness, South Sudan is economically one of

the world’s poorest countries. Besides, this sub-Saharan country has a long history of oppression,

social injustices, wars, tribal conflicts and gross human rights violations. On 15 December 2013

an internal armed conflict erupted and soon became a brutal civil war that still continues across the

country. As far as religion is concerned, Christianity is the majority, followed by Traditional

Religion and Islam.

IMPORTANCE OF LAND IN SOUTH SUDAN

Leaving aside the current civil war in South Sudan, land is a central issue to all rural communities.

Almost all the land in South Sudan is under communal ownership. Individuals of the same clan,

community, or ethnicity only own it through continual use. It is critical to livelihoods and

development, a means for basic survival and a source of individual and tribal pride. Over the years

there were hardly any dispute arising over land use except among cattle owning groups or between

livestock herders and sedentary cultivators. It could be said, however, that land has also defined

the history of the country and was at the heart of the long years of struggle for liberation and

independence from Khartoum government (1983-2005). People sought to secure their lands and

natural resources from misappropriation and alienation.

LAND TENURE IN SOUTH SUDAN

According to the Transitional Constitution of the Republic of South Sudan, 2011, the land tenure

system in the country consists of three general types of land: public, community and private.

Public land includes, but is not limited to all land owned, held or otherwise acquired by any level

of government as defined by law, and all land which is not otherwise classified as community or

private. Community land includes all lands traditionally and historically held or used by local

communities or their members. Private land includes registered land held by any person under

leasehold tenure in accordance with the law, investment land acquired under lease from the

Government or community for purposes of social and economic development in accordance with

the law, and any other land designated as private land by law. The Constitution also states that “all

land in South Sudan is owned by the people of South Sudan and its usage shall be regulated by the

government in accordance with the provisions of this Constitution and the law” (The Transitional

Constitution of the Republic of South Sudan, 2011: Land Ownership, 170, 1-6).

LAND GRABBING IN SOUTH SUDAN

In the whole of Africa millions of hectares of arable land have been bought, at very low price, in

order to produce food, animal feed, or bio-fuel for the benefit of speculators, but damaging the

local farmers and shepherds from whom it has been taken access to land and water. There are

reports that land in South Sudan is being acquired for investment on the sectors of agriculture,

forestry and bio-fuel in this country. This makes South Sudan one of the top 10 countries targeted

by investors for large-scale land acquisitions.

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According to the Oakland Institute, the Equatoria region of South Sudan is where a lot of land

grabbing has taken place. In 2008, a land deal was signed between Nile Trading and Development

and Mukaya Payam Cooperative. This agreement highlights a lease of 600,000 hectares of land in

49 years. Also, a 2011 report says that in just four years foreign interests acquired a total of 2.64

million hectares of land (26,400 km2) for the agriculture, forestry and bio-fuel sectors alone

(Norwegian People’s Aid, The new frontier: A baseline survey of large-scale land-based

investment in Southern Sudan, 2011).

Other land grabbing-related activities may have taken place when Petroleum explorations began in

the country back in 1975 and following decades. In this process local communities living in or

near the oil fields experienced attacks, harassment and displacement from the central government

and from breakaway groups during the war (1983-2005). In addition, the price for the land that

was leased in the case above was too low. There was lack of transparency to the public about the

land deal until the agreement and reports were released.

TACKLING LAND GRABBING IN SOUTH SUDAN

The oil business in South Sudan comes under a national project implemented in the public interest

and is also responsible for land grabbing and source of conflicts. The 2005 Comprehensive Peace

Agreement (CPA) requires that any negative impact of the oil industry on local communities is to

be compensated in money terms or in development projects for damages linked to development of

subterranean resources, including oil. In practice this is not always the case.

The Comboni Missionaries in South Sudan opened a mission in Leer in 1996, which is located in

South Sudan’s leading state in oil production called Unity State. Huge areas across Leer mission

have been surveyed and oil exploitation will be done at some point. Instead, Thar Jath (Block 5A)

oil field has already started its operation in Koch in April 1999, a county that is also under our

Comboni mission. Oil production in this block effectively started in April 2006, after the

independence war.

Oil production in the beginning was linked with serious human rights abuses, such as forced

displacement from oil fields, killings and arbitrary arrest. More recently oil production has been

linked with environmental pollution. The oil companies have been operating in the area for a good

number of years but the people surrounding them get very little or nothing from the oil production.

In fact, very few of them actually know something about oil production, transportation, value, and

how much money the government gets from the oil revenues. It is not even known whether these

communities were compensated for the use of their land.

I served in Leer Comboni mission from 2010 until 2014, when the current civil war forced the

missionaries to suspend the activities in Leer mission due to insecurity. Most of the population had

to flee and oil facilities were also damaged and stopped. From 2014 to date I have been dealing

with justice and peace activities from Juba, South Sudan’s capital city. Both in Leer and Juba land

grabbing was dealt with mostly at the level of raising awareness about it.

Here is a summary of activities and initiatives to tackle justice and peace issues, including land

grabbing:

a) Leer mission (St. Joseph the Worker Parish: 2010-2014)

• Data collection on land grabbing;

• A series of workshops on the Transitional Constitution 2011 was conducted in the

parish/mission. This raised awareness on land grabbing and other related issues;

• Formation of a parish justice and peace commission and justice and peace groups in each

county comprising the mission (this was initiated and put on a hold due to the war);

• A dialogue with other parishes/diocese and a couple of non-governmental organisation

was also initiated.

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b) Justice and Peace Office (Juba: 2014 to date)

• Circulation of news articles and documents related to justice and peace issues, including

land grabbing;

• Participation at the 2015 World Social Forum in Tunis through the Comboni Justice and

Peace Network. Workshops on land grabbing and other justice and peace issues were

conducted;

• Participation in Nairobi’s Conference on Land Grabbing, 2015 (attended by Fr. D.

Moschetti);

• Participation at the 2016 World Social Forum in Montreal through the Comboni Justice

and Peace Network. Workshops on land grabbing and other justice and peace issues were

conducted;

• Production of a Justice and Peace Manual – a tool for parish justice and peace

committees. Among the relevant justice and peace issues in South Sudan today discussed

in this Manual is land grabbing. The manual raises awareness on these issues and

motivate groups to take action on them.

September 2017.

Raimundo Rocha, mccj

Comboni Missionaries South Sudan