More than 50 unified forces have died and over 1,500 others are likely to miss the upcoming graduation ceremony at the Kaljak Training Centre in South Sudan’s Unity State, a military official there said.
In an interview with Radio Tamazuj, Col. Deng Chan Makuac, the supervisor at Kaljack Training Centre said 56 forces died at the centre since the start of training up to now, and 1,549 forces may miss out due to health and other challenges at the centre.
“We have 56 people dead. They are 14 women and 42 men from the beginning of the training until now. They died of different diseases; some died due to hepatitis, tuberculosis (TB), and normal deaths,” Col. Chan explained. “There was an incident that happened between the former commissioner of Mayom and local youth, we lost two to three forces, and also there was another incident in Koch between the army and local youth, we lost three forces.”
Two years ago, the Kaljack center registered 4,519 forces for training. However, Col. Chan says only 2,970 forces are at the training centre now.
“From the beginning, we had 4,519 forces. Right now cannot tell you exactly the number of forces available because we have some forces who are not available in the camp and when the committee comes, the number may increase in the camp. We have 2,970 forces ready right now,” he said.
The head of the training centre said some forces are in Mayom, Mayiendit, Koch, Leer, and Pariang and are expected to return when the graduation committee arrives at the centre.
He urged all forces who have deserted the camp to come back to attend the graduation that will take place at the Bentiu Independence Stadium next year.
“I want to inform those still in Mayom County and other far places from Bentiu to start coming because this is the last week for their arrival and next week will be a week for the graduation,” he said.
The batch at Kaljak was supposed to be graduated end of November but that was postponed to early next year.
According to the new roadmap, the necessary unified forces were supposed to move from the training centres to their duty stations or locations by September 30, 2022, but this has not taken place as expected.
Source: Radio Tamazuj