Why was the Africa “Amnesty Month” kept out of the picture in South Sudan?

So, South Sudan is missing out on the African Union’s campaign of “Silencing the Guns” by the year 2020; who is to blame? The African Union Security or the United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs to a greater extent? Maybe, just maybe.
Three years after the AU launched the peace-oriented campaign as part of their agenda 2063, the efforts to achieve its intended objective proved singularly ineffective. According to the Conflict Trends report published late 2019, armed conflicts have soared across the continent after the initiative of silencing the guns by 2020 was implemented.
South Sudan, Africa’s youngest nation has been no exception among countries where the AU campaign to silence the guns fell flat as holdouts to the 2018 Revitalized Peace Agreement continue to unleash mayhem.
The AU let South Sudan down
Firstly, the goal to silence the guns by 2020 was too ambitious given the different forms and complexities of armed crises in the country. Secondly, the body should have realized that some of these conflicts were internal, arising from the grudges that local communities have against each other. This internal dynamic was largely ignored from the outset.
Until the AU recognize this and design solutions to conflicts that are informed by the need to protect human rights, it shoulders the sole responsibility for failing to achieve its own goal. Being the biggest body on the continent, the AU should be empowered to act against any party that violates core values centred on human dignity.
The AU placed so much emphasis on promoting peace, security, and stability in Africa, including in its widely-criticized Agenda 2063, which came to effect five years ago. However, peace, security and stability in the continent remained elusive, and some conflicts have raged on for decades.
In 2002, the AU changed it Constitutive Act, allowing it to intervene in the internal affairs of member states; it has never done that. For instance, it is conspicuously silent when forces allied to the National Salvation Front led by Thomas Cirilo wages attacks on civilians and targeted senior government officials in Central Equatoria State.
The Africa Month of Amnesty and UNODA
In 2017, the AU earmarked September 21 a day when citizens in possession of illegally-acquired arms in all African countries surrender such weapons to the government. The commemoration would run until 2020.
But as that day draws closer, South Sudan appears proximally distanced from the reason why the day is commemorated; yes, you guessed it, civilians never willingly surrendered weapons to the government and disarmament attempts from the State proved futile in many regions across South Sudan.
Last week, Ivor Richard Fung, the Deputy Chief of the Conventional Arms Branch at the United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs (UNODA) boldly stated the Amnesty Month has been greatly successful in multiple African countries, including Burkina Faso, Central African Republic, Madagascar, Sudan, and Zambia.
“The message has spread far and wide in these countries to mobilize people around the issue of small arms,” Fung told the Africa Renewal in an exclusive interview.
In three years, only five countries, out of 54 got the message about the “Amnesty Month” and at least two of them are from central Africa. UNODA, the AU and other partners clearly side-lined South Sudan and war-affected countries though they could have worked to better sensitize citizens and help them understand what the month means.