South Sudan

James Duddridge Excerpts

Wednesday 7th December 2016 Westminster Hall

[James Duddridge (Rochford and Southend East) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the Chair of the Select Committee, the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg); I am reassured that the issue is receiving the attention of not only the all-party parliamentary group for Sudan and South Sudan, but also that of the Select Committee. I am an Afro-optimist, but I must admit there is very little to be optimistic about in South Sudan, which is perhaps one of the reasons why we should engage in the subject. I sometimes wonder about the anecdote of the MP who says, “I did something about this; I spoke about it in the House of Commons”; the constituent reminds them that that does not in itself effect change.

As I have gone from country to country in Africa, I have occasionally read in the local papers about proceedings in our Chamber—the references and the criticisms. They are taken seriously. I would very much like the Minister, through our ambassador in Juba or through Christopher Trott, our special representative for Sudan and South Sudan, to take a copy of Hansard and to say to Riek Machar or Salva Kiir, “The ex-Minister for Africa, James Duddridge, was not happy.” Let them see the support that their citizens have from us here in the House of Commons.

All too often in meetings, Kiir and the President seemed to be more interested in their own political future and dividing up the cake. I remember a farcical argument about who did which Cabinet jobs, and it became apparent that the Cabinet jobs with lots of cash flowing through were the ones of interest. It was the personal and financial interest of those involved that drove things forward.

I am not going to be particularly diplomatic. My private office always reminded me as a Minister, “You are the first diplomat.” This was when they gave me a lecture on being more diplomatic. The worst Foreign Minister I met in my two years was Barnaba Benjamin, who, thankfully, has now been sacked. He was oblivious to the need for a proper dialogue and change. I am not sure about the degree to which he was authorised on behalf of the Government to take such a position in the UN, but we are certainly in a better position without him.

Festus Mogae, the ex-President of Botswana, was a strong influence when I was dealing with the situation, but he was heavily under-resourced. I urge the excellent Minister to have discussions with his Foreign Office colleagues to make sure Festus Mogae gets all the resources he needs. A few thousand pounds to fly the right people to the right location to chat or paying the hotel bill for a few nights for the right people might sound trivial, but it can be transformational in its effect.

The Chair of the Select Committee referred to infrastructure problems and physically getting around the country. One looks at a map, but the roads are impassable physically or impassable because of the security situation. One cannot get around unless one flies into regional airports.

There is also a broader infrastructure problem. The international community got it disastrously wrong when South Sudan was declared an independent nation state. The international community, including the UK Government, felt that if certain building blocks were provided, a principal one being an election, everything would sort itself out. When I was in Juba meeting people from civil society, they said, “What you do not appreciate is that everything has been stripped away. Everything that you consider normal in the community—the checks, the balances, the free press, the local councils, the parish councils, and, to a degree, even the churches—have been eliminated.” We should reflect on that in other situations.

I remember, bizarrely, South Sudan taking a great interest in the Scottish referendum, and I realised why. They did not want Scotland to be independent, simply because they would no longer be the newest nation state in the world. They were vehement in their opposition. There was an undertone of pride about being a new nation state. There was hope and drive there. It was very strange. When I visited, the IMF was due to arrive. The situation seemed wholly farcical. The economy was in total collapse and the support of the IMF would have made sense only if the Government system was sorted. I am interested to find out how that has developed.

In the UN camps, I visited women who had been raped—some in the camps themselves, but principally outside the camps. I was struck by what I heard. I had been told to expect graphic stories of how they had been raped so that I would appreciate the horror of the situation. However, none of them wanted to discuss that—not because I was a man, but because they were used to politicians coming in and listening. They knew that I was meeting Salva Kiir the next day and they had specific policy recommendations: “You need to tell our President this; you need to tell our President that.” They clearly felt totally disenfranchised.

At the UN I met two female British police officers. I am interested to know whether the secondment of UK police forces to the camps is still working. That was really useful because people were getting raped in the camps. The UN camps were relatively porous and people could get in and out. The police officers helped the community to police themselves. They acted almost as police trainers to the community, rather than policing the area themselves.

We should learn lessons from when people come back together. When Machar came back to Juba, he brought bodyguards, which, given the history, makes a lot of sense. I suggested that some should come early to pave the way so that there were no misunderstandings among the combatant forces. I expected two, maybe 10, maybe 20, bodyguards—there were 1,000. I am no military man, but that sounds more like a battalion than close protection officers.

There was a bizarre debate over whether we should transport the rocket-propelled machinery. We ended up helping to bring back some of the rocket-propelled devices, but not the actual cartridges that go in them. Indeed, when things unravelled, it was among the bodyguards that things started around the presidential compound.

We need to look at the situation in relation to Sudan more generally. It is good that the all-party group is covering both areas, particularly the Chinese relationship and the oil relationship. When looking at the numbers, it struck me that there did not seem to be any economic sense in pumping oil and sending it to China. I could not quite work out why it was economic to do that, unless there were big bribes going on behind the scenes, separate from the flows to China.

This was one of the two areas, the other being Burundi, that, despite my being an Afrophile and Afro-optimist, kept me up at night. I do not know what one could have done differently, but I hope that those places still keep some at the Foreign Office up at night—I am sure they do. With all due respect, I hope they occasionally keep the Minister up at night, looking at what we can do for the people of South Sudan, as well as those who have left it and its neighbouring countries.