Ethnic Configuration as a Bane to Political Crisis in Africa with South Sudan in Perspective

Abstract

The study undertook the historical back ground of South Sudan and their political history. From the two civil wars they fought with Sudan, before  they were allowed to conduct a referendum which ushered them to independence. However upon independence they had issues with oil field  sharing with Sudan which made them shut down their oil production for about six months. There were excess money which accrued from crude  production and sell which went into wrong hands, to the extent that ordinary man on the street was dealing on oil through the ‘back door’. However,  a major catalyst to the crisis was the mutual suspicion and overzealous ambitions of political class, particularly between the President Kiir  and former Vice President Bachar. Their ethnic cleavages did not help matters as they brought it in into a political crisis that ordinarily needed a  political solution. Arms proliferations worsen the situation, as well as unprofessionalism in the army recruitment, as they recruited based on ethnic  loyalty. Unfortunately International interventions did not help issues. Leading the great carnage committed in the cause of the war, with its huge  losses in term of properties, public buildings, human lives, etc. The study took a critical and peculiar nature of this crisis and came up with  hypothesis to mitigate future occurrence and how to bring a lasting peace to the environment bedeviled by this crisis. Secondary sources of data  which are literatures from various sources were used. Group theory as well as Game theory was the major anchor of theoretical analysis. Various  concepts were carefully analysed. The lesson from this study can be applied to the various parts of the world where similar crisis hold sway to find  amicable solution to them.