South Sudan’s legal community is seeking protection from state security agencies, citing harassment and intimidation of advocates by the National Security Service (NSS).
The NSS is accused of targeting lawyers who seek redress at the East African Court of Justice (EACJ), as many avoid local courts due to fear of not receiving justice.
In the past two months, security agents have detained two individuals, including a former mayor, without warrants and denied lawyers access to them and information about their whereabouts.
One of the detainees, Kalisto Lado, a former mayor of Juba, was seized from his home on March 28, 2024, and is allegedly being held at the NSS headquarters, known as the Blue House.
Lado’s wife, Ann-Grace Juan Florentina Loro, has sued the South Sudan Attorney General at the EACJ, seeking her husband’s release and a declaration that his kidnapping and detention without trial are breaches of the East African Community’s fundamental principles and national laws. She also seeks reparations and punitive damages for the violation of her husband’s rights and freedoms.
The NSS has been harassing Wani Santino Jada, the advocate representing Loro, according to documents filed with the EACJ. On April 24, 2024, armed security agents in plain clothes visited Jada’s law firm offices in Juba and told him to “back off” the case, claiming they had instructions “from above.” Jada has refused to do so and is seeking the regional court’s protection.
The lawyers argue that the NSS’s actions are part of a pattern of intimidation and harassment of lawyers and rights activists, citing several records of kidnappings, killings, forced disappearances, and torture by security agents.
They urge the EACJ to direct the Attorney-General of South Sudan to refrain from harassing and intimidating Jada and to strongly condemn the NSS’s unconstitutional behavior.
The EACJ and Human Rights Watch have documented cases of intimidation of lawyers and their outspoken clients.
In April 2024, the NSS produced Morris Mabior Awikjok Bak, a South Sudanese critic and former refugee in Kenya, before a county court in Juba to face charges of criminal defamation against the NSS director.
Bak had been detained by the NSS since February 4, 2023, and his detention was only acknowledged in April 2024.
The 2014 National Security Service Act gives the NSS broad powers, which have been criticized for leading to unchecked mass violence and entrenched repression in South Sudan, threatening durable peace and human rights protection.
The UN Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan has flagged these concerns in its March 2024 report.
