A food donated by the Office of the First Lady to vulnerable people in Aweil town, Northern Bahr el Ghazal State, could not reach its intended recipients after some residents looted it on Thursday.
During the presidential visit to the area early this week, Mary Ayen promised to provide the vulnerable people with food.
These are war widows, the visually impaired, and those the disabled, who had asked the first lady for support.
However, when a pickup laden with bags of maize flour arrived this morning, some people looted it. In photographs seen Akol Yam, able-bodied women are seen fleeing with the loot.
“Most of the people sustained injuries during the looting. Anyway, this is not good for such thing to happen because the food belonged to the vulnerable people,” said a resident who declined to identified.
Another resident blamed the issue on the committee tasked with distributing the food to vulnerable people.
“We requested the team to take the food to Mathiang where it would be distributed, but the team refused. As a result, a mother got injuries, and no one will treat her,” said Deng – not real name.
Akol Yam FM’s efforts to reach the team tasked by the first lady to give out the food was not immediately successful.
During the public rallies in Aweil town and Arroyo, community leaders mentioned hunger as a major issue facing people across the state.
They appealed to President Salva Kiir and governor Tong Akeen to help them by either providing them with food or lowering food prices in the sta