As South Sudan\u2019s opposition leader, Dr Riek Machar, flies to Johannesburg on Wednesday for medical treatment, his armed followers stand accused of carrying out an attack on three civilian buses travelling from South Sudan\u2019s capital Juba to Kampala in Uganda.<\/p>\n
On Monday, armed gunmen, swearing to overthrow South Sudanese President Salva Kiir\u2019s government, ambushed three buses using rocket-propelled grenades and other heavy weaponry as the buses approached Uganda\u2019s border with South Sudan.<\/p>\n
Brigadier Lul Ruai Koang, the spokesperson of the Sudan People\u2019s Liberation Army (SPLA) in government, said rebels loyal to Machar, the former first vice president, were behind the attacks, Uganda\u2019s Observer newspaper reported on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe political and military leadership of Machar\u2019s SPLA-IO has always come out to say that such attacks were carried out by their forces. But what is bothering our minds is why they are targeting civilians?\u201d asked Koang.<\/p>\n
The spokesman added that Machar\u2019s forces were bent on making South Sudan ungovernable by staging ambushes on major roads that lead to the capital, hence cutting it off from its main supply routes, reported the Observer.<\/p>\n
\u201cFrom the way they have been carrying out their ambushes, it is an indication that they are against peace in the country. They are also motivated by greed because in every ambush, they loot people of all their valuables, including phones and money,\u201d Koang added<\/p>\n
During Monday\u2019s attacks, one of the bus drivers was shot in the leg as he tried to escape and one of the buses was torched after the terrified passengers, mostly Ugandans, had been robbed at gunpoint of personal belongings and had their passports confiscated.<\/p>\n
The passengers were eventually released after being forced to march several kilometres in the bush but not before being subjected to a verbal tirade against Dinkas who are from the same tribe as Kiir.<\/p>\n
The gunmen also threatened to wipe out Ugandans if they continued to side with the Dinkas and Kiir\u2019s government.<\/p>\n
Koang used to be the spokesperson of the Sudan People\u2019s Liberation Movement in opposition (SPLM-IO) before he fell out with Machar in 2015.<\/p>\n
The majority of South Sudan\u2019s imports enter the country through the Nimule border point with Uganda.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
As South Sudan\u2019s opposition leader, Dr Riek Machar, flies to Johannesburg on Wednesday for medical treatment, his armed followers stand accused of carrying out an attack on three civilian buses travelling from South Sudan\u2019s capital Juba to Kampala in Uganda. On Monday, armed gunmen, swearing to overthrow South Sudanese President Salva Kiir\u2019s government, ambushed three […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":188473,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[550,745],"tags":[5802,880,5677,2711,5838,5839,1510,733,5840,2062],"class_list":["post-7043","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-south-sudan","category-uganda","tag-dr-riek-machar","tag-juba","tag-juba-news","tag-kampala","tag-kampala-news","tag-machar","tag-salva-kiir","tag-south-sudan-news","tag-spla-io","tag-uganda-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7043"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7043\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/188473"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}