Citizens petition Juba City Council to bar foreigners from water business

The South Sudanese citizens are calling on the government to lock out foreign nationals from driving water bowsers saying the vehicles are responsible for rampant road accidents that have claimed more than five lives in the space of a month.

A petition submitted to the Juba City Council calling for the restriction of water supply business to South Sudanese nationals has received nearly 3,000 signatures out of the required 5000.

The online petition ran on Changge.org was started by Isaac Makuer Cagai.

 ‘‘The water in Juba is controlled by greedy individuals who do not properly treat the water before selling it to consumers. In addition, the water tanker drivers drive recklessly causing hundreds of deaths in a bid to quickly deliver and refill their tanks to make a profit,’’ Cagai notes in the petition.

The protests

The move was particularly triggered by the death of Trisha C, a female South Sudanese artist who died after sustaining excruciating injuries while on a motorbike, commonly known as boda-boda at Mobil Roundabout.

While the motorbike operator died on spot after he was overridden by a water tanker operated by a foreigner believed to be an Ethiopian, Trisha died at Juba Teaching Hospital due to excessive bleeding – which resulted from lack of attention from health personnel at the hospital.

The petition says while water is a national security concern in countries like Egypt and Sudan, the water source in South Sudan has been auctioned out to foreigners with unmatched scale of greediness.

Unlike other countries across the East African region, South Sudan has let its business space wide open and businesses such as water selling, legally reserved for nationals, have been overtaken by foreign bidders using financial muscles to escape legal consequences.

The petition says besides driving unlawfully, carelessly, and claiming hundreds of lives through accidents, the water tanker drivers also trade untreated water to citizens, infecting thousands with waterborne diseases.

In 2019, The Sentry, an American watchdog published a hard-hitting report which reveals that at least 600,000 South Sudanese citizens in urban centres were victims of environmental pollution which affects the country’s main water source, the Nile.

“It is high time the Juba City Council takes action to ensure our lives are protected from reckless drivers and dirty drinking water,” part of the petition reads.

The three-point petition calls on the government to fully nationalize the business of water supply in time many South Sudanese are were roaming the streets without jobs.

“Juba City Council can restrict the drivers to be South Sudanese nationals. There is no way they (foreigners) own the trucks and minimum jobs such as driving when the money they make goes out of the country,” it says.