South Sudan in Brief

It's 3 March, Sunday. I'm in the MSF-France Juba guest house. I arrived here on 1 March, Friday afternoon. We have to take the cargo planes from Juba to Aweil. They are supposed to take the relief to different areas. There are three flights passing Aweil each week. I'll take off tomorrow morning. The country of Sudan is basically divided into two. The North belongs to the Arabic, Islamic society. The South is the African tribes and Christian societies. There are over fifty different tribes just in South Sudan. Juba is the capital of South Sudan. The Peace Agreement between the Sudanese and South Sudan Government was signed in 2003. There was no major fight recently in the region. The major disputes between the two governments are on the share of the oil trade, the border boundary and the use of River Nile resources. Most of the oil fields are on the side of the South but the business is under control of Sudanese government. The South only gets a little share if they can really get the money. So you can imagine all these benefits would drive the conflicts going on. Besides, there are clashes among different tribes. The most recent ones are on the migration of nomads from the North to the South during the rainy season for water sources. Lots of clashes are expected. Aweil is a place closed to the North-South border, along the migration route. We'll expect more and more injuries coming in to the hospital. There is a reason MSF chose to return to this region. Aweil hospital is still a government operated hospital. MSF has started an Obstetric/Gynaecology and a nutrition programme in Aweil in January. Two general surgeons have been sent so far. I'm the third one and I'm going to relieve the second one on next Monday. My mission is supposed finish at the end of March. Besides looking after the surgical emergencies, of which they expect few, my main task is to access the need for full-scale surgical services. There are already  operating theatre, delivery and anaesthetic facilities. But it seems that nursing care is grossly sub-standard. Nurses are under paid and have no incentive to learn Some are illiterate. The full scale surgical service means a strong commitment from MSF side. The number of clinical activities is not great at the moment. We don't know whether it reflects the true need or a hidden or suppressed demand from the sub-standard service before. A 50,000 population in the town and overran estimated million plus returnees in the region plus the predicted clashes going on may mean a lot of surgeries in the future. My Head of Mission told me not to consider other political or resource issues. My task is to give them a recommendation according to the need and capacity of MSF. It sounds like it will be different from my experience in Liberia but probably a challenging one. Aweil is on the northwest part of South Sudan. Darfur, the most violent and tragic area, is next to it on the West. It belongs to the North Sudan territory, but most people there are African. There are oil fields. This is the main reason for massive population movement and human crisis. The major challenge now is the hot weather, nearly 35C. They say that it may reach 40 to 45C in April. I need to take a lot of water. I have to take panadol for the bad headache in the afternoons. It takes time to adapt. Anyway, I can survive. Don't worry. Au Yiu Kai