A SOUTH Sudanese bishop has warned that food is being used as a weapon by parties involved in the brutal civil war in Sudan, a country on the brink of famine.
“They harass humanitarian agencies,” the RC Bishop of Yei, the Rt Revd Alex Lodiong Sakor Eyobo, told the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales last week. “And, when humanitarian agencies are harassed, they stop delivering food because they also have to protect their own lives.
“The food aid sometimes is blocked by the RSF [Rapid Support Forces], not allowing them [the agencies] to enter. Because when you take food aid to the people, you are also going to feed their own enemies.
“So, they use food as a weapon, so that once food is not delivered, their enemy is weakened. That’s their point of view.”
On 27 June, an Integrated Food Security Phase Classification report warned that, 14 months into the conflict, Sudan was facing the worst levels of acute food insecurity it had ever recorded in the country: a “stark and rapid deterioration” since its last update in December. More than half of the population (25.6 million people) faced “crisis or worse conditions”, while 750,000 people faced “catastrophe” (characterised by starvation, death, destitution, and extremely critical acute malnutrition levels).
There was a risk of famine in 14 areas, including Greater Darfur. UNICEF has warned that more than 700,000 children under five are at risk of dying. More children are displaced in Sudan than anywhere else in the world.
The last time that famine was declared in East Africa was in South Sudan, in 2017, and, before that, in Somalia, in 2011. “In those cases, hundreds of thousands of lives were lost, and children have suffered long-term impacts from malnutrition and loss of agriculture outputs,” World Vision said in a statement on 27 June. “The situation in Sudan is similarly grim.” To date, it has reached almost 1.8 million people, including children, in Sudan, providing relief including food assistance.
“The biggest challenge aid agencies are facing is humanitarian access,” the interim national director for World Vision Sudan, John Makoni, said. “We need unhindered access to reach the people most in need with life-saving assistance. Any further delays can be catastrophic, and will result in deaths.”
“The famine is not because there is drought: it’s because of the conflict,” Bishop Eyobo said. “Even if there is food available in the market, you have no means to buy it. . . People are moving, they are being chased from their places, they cannot produce food, and, since they cannot produce food, that sets up the place for famine.
“Life is being destroyed, property is being destroyed, and, before you realise, everything is gone,” he said. “And to reconstruct is not going to be very easy. So, our appeal is that the humanitarian community becomes proactive, acts fast, so that these issues are handled.”
The Church was working to prevent local communities’ being “used by the elites”, he reported, “because the elites use our people for their own gain, and our people are then the ones who suffer.”
Last week, a statement from the Sudan and South Sudan Catholic Bishops’ Conference was issued: “The fabric of Sudanese society has been torn apart, with people shocked, traumatized, and disbelieving about the level of violence and hatred.
“This is not simply a war between two generals. . . The military has inextricably embedded itself in the economic life of the country, and both SAF [Sudanese Armed Forces] and RSF each have a network of wealthy elite Sudanese and international individuals and cartels who benefit from their control of various sectors of the economy.” The statement urged the warring leaders to “think of the people and nation”.
The UN’s emergency-relief agency UNHCR warned on 2 July that, in addition to famine and “brutal” human-rights violations, Sudan was expecting the worst floods for years. People would be “trapped where they are with little aid and not able to flee”. Only 19 per cent of the required funds for the agency’s refugee response have been received to date. Its head said last month that he had been told that one mother had cooked up dirt, “just to put something in her children’s stomach”.